Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden will get tested for coronavirus later today after sharing the stage with President Donald Trump during the presidential debate on Tuesday.
It comes just hours after the US president announced he and his wife, Melania Trump, have tested positive for coronavirus and are in quarantine.
Mr Trump’s diagnosis also comes during a crucial period before the November elections, with both his and Mr Biden’s campaigns thrown into a tailspin.
Questions have been raised over whether the former vice-president should suspend his campaign while his rival remains in quarantine for the next 15 days.
But the development settles the focus of the campaign right where Mr Biden has put his emphasis for months: on Trump's response to a pandemic that has killed more than 200,000 people in the US. And for the short term, it's grounded Mr Trump in isolation, denying him the large public rallies that fuel his campaign.
“From now until we get to the election, attention is going to be back where it should be: on Covid, the president's response and the impact — and on health care,” said Democratic strategist Antjuan Seawright, a Biden supporter. “This proves our candidate was right all along.”
Karen Finney, another Democratic consultant and top adviser to Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, said the immediate focus should be on the Trumps' health. But she added the development proves that not even Mr Trump, no matter his talents for dictating headlines and framing events, can control a pandemic.
“It's a reminder that the American presidency is bigger than any one person, given the reach and depth this news has,” she said, noting that a health scare for a president not only dominates headlines but can rattle financial markets.
Trump tweeted Friday that he'd begin quarantining and recovery. He's cancelled his weekend itinerary in Wisconsin, one of the three Great Lakes states that he won by less than one percentage point in 2016 on his way to the presidency.
Americans have already begun voting in several states, meanwhile, and tens of millions will receive absentee mail-in ballots or be eligible for in-person early voting in the coming weeks.
Additional reporting by AP
