Vice President Mike Pence’s trip to Arizona earlier this week was postponed by a day after several of the Secret Service agents who had helped to pull the visit together tested positive for COVID-19 or showed symptoms of the disease.
Senior administration officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Pence's trip to Phoenix had originally been scheduled for Tuesday, but he traveled on Wednesday instead to Arizona, which has seen a steep climb in coronavirus cases over the past few weeks, The Washington Post reported Thursday.
Last weekend, the vice president's staff had been concerned about the ability to hold public events in Tucson and Yuma, and later decided to visit Phoenix for a public health briefing with Gov. Doug Ducey and local healthcare officials.
The Secret Service urged Pence's staff to delay the trip for a day, after it was learned that at least one agent on the ground in Arizona had a confirmed case of COVID-19, to give the agency time to bring in healthy agents. According to the Post's source, the Secret Service estimated that there were eight to 10 agents and other officials preparing for Pence's trip who were sick.
Last month, three Secret Service personnel working on President Donald Trump's advance team for his June 20 Tulsa rally tested positive for the coronavirus, and two more agents tested positive shortly before the indoor event started. Agents on site for the rally had to self-quarantine when they returned home.
Pence spokesman Devin O'Malley declined to comment on the Arizona trip delay, instead accusing the Post of reporting on a story of "little use" to everyday Americans instead of focusing on Pence and his work heading the White House Coronavirus Task Force.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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