Christie says Trump, Meadows should have warned him of positive COVID-19 test

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) said in a new interview with PBS that former President Trump and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows should have told him that Trump had tested positive for COVID-19 and that a second test showed he was negative.

Christie, in an interview with Margaret Hoover on the PBS show “Firing Line,” said that it’s “inexcusable” Mark Meadows didn’t reveal Trump’s positive COVID-19 test during debate prep and “saved it for a book.”

When asked if Trump should have told him about his first test result, Christie replied, “That’s obvious. Of course, Trump should have told all of us.”

He added, “Mark knew and should have said to all of us, ‘Hey, the president tested positive for COVID. We’re having another test,’ and then the next test came back negative from what he reported.”

Christie emphasized that Trump “had an obligation to tell us that he tested positive. I would have worn a mask if I knew that. We knew everybody in that room, except for the president, was getting tested every day. We didn’t know what the president’s testing regimen was. So if Mark Meadows knew that somebody that I was sitting across from for four days had popped the positive test, [he] should have told us.”

Instead, Christie said that Meadows saved the revelation “for a book”. 

“He didn’t tell us. I went into the hospital in the intensive care unit. He didn’t call and tell me. So I think that’s inexcusable,” he added.

NEW: @GovChristie says it’s “inexcusable” Mark Meadows didn’t reveal President Trump’s positive COVID test during debate prep and “saved it for a book.”

So does Christie, who spent a week in intensive care with the virus, believe Trump infected him?

“I think it’s undeniable.” pic.twitter.com/bS8zJM8uUB

— Firing Line with Margaret Hoover (@FiringLineShow) December 9, 2021

When asked if he suspected that the former president had been the one from whom he got COVID-19, Christie said that the only reason he suspected it was because Trump was the only person whose testing regimen he didn’t know that he was in close contact with. 

“I think it’s undeniable,” he added, when asked by Hoover to confirm if he did in fact get it from Trump.

In response to a question about what he thought about Trump working with him on debate prep for four days after his positive test, Christie said, “I’m not excusing any of it. But it’s all brand-new information to me.”

“I was playing Joe Biden. I was sitting right across from him. And we had some very spirited disagreements, so saliva was flying back and forth … I didn’t have any COVID particles. And the reason I know is because I was tested every day before I went in,” Christie said.

Additionally, Christie revealed that six of the seven people in the room caught the virus following the debate prep.

“Hope Hicks, Bill Stepien, Kellyanne Conway, me, Stephen Miller and Donald Trump all wound up with COVID in that room,” Christie added.

When asked if he still calls Trump his friend, Christie added that it was a “historical reference.”

“We’re obviously, as I just told you, not friendly at the moment.” 

Trump did not immediately respond to The Hill’s request for comment.

Christie tested positive for the coronavirus on Oct. 3, just two days after Trump and first lady Melania Trump reported testing positive for COVID-19, and had previously revealed that he was seriously ill with the coronavirus.

Since the revelations from Meadows’s book, “The Chief’s Chief,” have been published, Meadows has attempted to backtrack his comments and support the former president, even retweeting Trump’s statement that said the “story of me having COVID prior to, or during, the first debate is Fake News.”