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What happens to Trump's re-election campaign? Here's who may come to power if POTUS' Covid-19 illness gets serious

If he were to be deprived of strength due to illness, the Constitution’s 25th Amendment spells out rules under which a president can declare themselves 'unable to discharge the powers and duties'

President Donald Trump announced on Friday, October 2, 2020, that he and his wife Melania Trump had been tested positive for coronavirus. "Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this TOGETHER!" he wrote and his tweet generated over 600,000 interactions on Twitter. The news soon sent shock waves all across the world and health experts couldn't help but wonder how the 74-year-old would fight serious complications from the disease which has killed more than 200,000 Americans and more than 1 million people worldwide.

The news came barely a couple of hours after Hope Hicks, a close aide of Trump, tested positive for Covid-19 and was experiencing symptoms. In a memo issued to reporters around 1 am ET, the President's physician Navy Cmdr Dr Sean Conley confirmed the positive tests and said, "The President and First Lady are both well at this time, and they plan to remain at home within the White House during their convalescence." Sharing the official statement from the physician, Karin Caifa, reporter for CNN, posted: "The White House has released this statement from President Trump’s physician, confirming that both the president and First Lady have tested positive for Covid-19."

Hicks is not the only one to have been tested positive for Covid-19. Multiple White House staffers previously tested positive for the virus, including vice-president Mike Pence’s press secretary Katie Miller, national security adviser Robert O’Brien and one of the president’s personal valets. As per a CNN report, Trump was last seen in public on Thursday, October 1, afternoon returning to the White House after a fundraising trip to New Jersey. Apart from putting Trump at high risk, the news also casts a cloud of doubt over the entire Republican re-election campaign. At this moment — with barely a month left for the Presidential Elections 2020 — his infection with the disease could destabilize the already heated socio-political climate and stock market futures.

Will Trump be isolated?

According to rules set by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), people who were in close contact with Hicks need to quarantine themselves. Not just the president and the first lady but it also includes senior members of the re-election campaign. Now the question remains if the symptoms continue after his quarantine period or fade away. This comes at the heels of two impending presidential debates against his Democratic nominee Joe Biden and there are only two options for the POTUS seem to be in sight: Either Trump will have to opt-out or virtually attend the debates.

“The president takes the health and safety of himself and everyone who works in support of him and the American people very seriously,” White House spokesman Judd Deere has said in a statement. “White House Operations collaborates with the physician to the president and the White House Military Office to ensure all plans and procedures incorporate current CDC guidance and best practices for limiting Covid-19 exposure to the greatest extent possible, both on complex and when the president is traveling.”

What happens to re-election campaign?

Apart from putting Trump at high risk, the news also casts a cloud of doubt over the entire Republican re-election campaign. At this moment — with barely a month left for the presidential elections — his infection with the disease could destabilize the already heated socio-political climate and stock market futures. With all the senior members isolated at the moment, will the re-election campaign come to a halt? Going by Trump's tweet, it's quite unclear what the future of his re-election campaign looks like. Moreover, his flippant and cavalier attitude to downplay the dangers of Covid-19 has also come under serious scrutiny, including his constant appearance without masks. “I felt no vulnerability whatsoever,” he said told reporters back in May.

As per several reports, the official White House schedule released less than an hour before the news still listed his plans to meet with supporters in Washington on Friday, October 2, then fly to Florida for a campaign rally near Orlando.

If he were to be deprived of strength due to illness, the Constitution’s 25th Amendment spells out the procedures under which a president can declare themselves “unable to discharge the powers and duties” of the presidency, as per an AP report. In that case, Trump will have to send a written note to the Senate president pro tempore, Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Meanwhile, vice-president Mike Pence would serve as acting president until Trump transmitted “a written declaration to the contrary”.

The AP report also reads: "The vice president and a majority of either the Cabinet or another body established by law can also declare the president unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, in which case Pence would “immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President” until Trump provides a written declaration on the contrary."