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West Wing fears COVID spread after Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis attends White House party

08 December 2020
Dan Ackermann

President Trump's lawyer Jenna Ellis has informed associates she has coronavirus, multiple sources tell Axios, stirring West Wing fears after she attended a senior staff Christmas party on Friday.

Driving the news: There are concerns about the potential for another White House superspreader event, though it was unclear whether Ellis posed a risk when she attended. Ellis declined to confirm the diagnosis to Axios.

  • "People brought their families," said one senior White House official who attended the party and has since been informed of Ellis' diagnosis.
  • The revelation follows Sunday's news that Ellis' legal sidekick Rudy Giuliani was hospitalized after testing positive.

Behind the scenes: Ellis showed up to the White House senior staff party in the East Wing on Friday as the guest of Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro and was not seen wearing a mask, according to sources who attended the indoor event.

  • "She had the nerve to show up at the senior staff Christmas party knowing everyone was furious with her for constantly stirring Trump up with nonsense," said a senior administration official.
  • Ellis and Giuliani have fanned conspiracy theories about Trump's loss to Joe Biden as they have sought to keep alive legal challenges or avenues to overturn the election's results.
  • The official said the news of her diagnosis after attending the party compounded this anger.

The bottom line: When I gave Ellis visibility of my reporting on Monday night — that she had tested positive and that some senior staff weren't happy — she replied that it was "rude" to text her after midnight, adding, "You must be more informed than me because I haven't heard that."

  • Three senior White House officials told Axios they had been informed of Ellis' diagnosis.
  • I followed up by asking Ellis repeatedly whether she wanted to deny our reporting that she has COVID and had informed the White House of this fact. Ellis did not reply.
  • Navarro did not respond to a request for comment.

Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times

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Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.

Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.

The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.

  • The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.

What the transcripts say:

  • Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
  • The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
  • Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."

Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.