Joe Biden has tested positive for COVID-19 and canceled his scheduled speech at a Las Vegas event.

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From the New York Post:

President Biden tested positive for COVID-19 Wednesday and abruptly boarded Air Force One to return to his vacation home in Delaware to recuperate — after glad-handing while symptomatic.

The 81-year-old president told reporters “I feel good” as he emerged — without a mask to protect others — from the presidential limo and walked up the stairs of the jet at Harry Reid International Airport.

Biden canceled a speech to a Latino advocacy group in Sin City due to his diagnosis.

UnidosUS president Janet Murguía announced the president was ill on stage as attendees began to wonder why Biden was running 90 minutes late to speak.

The news follows Biden saying in an interview he would consider dropping out of the presidential election if a doctor diagnosed him with a ‘medical condition.’

The Associated Press reports:

President Joe Biden tested positive for COVID-19 while traveling Wednesday in Las Vegas and is experiencing “mild symptoms” including “general malaise” from the infection, the White House said.

Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden will fly to his home in Delaware, where he will “self-isolate and will continue to carry out all of his duties fully during that time.” The news had first been shared by Unidos US President and CEO Janet Murguía, who told guests at the group’s convention in Las Vegas that president had sent his regrets and could not appear because he tested positive for the virus.

Dr. Kevin O’Connor, the president’s physician, said in a note that Biden, 81, “presented this afternoon with upper respiratory symptoms, to include rhinorhea (runny nose) and non-productive cough, with general malaise.” After the positive COVID-19 test, Biden was prescribed the antiviral drug Paxlovid and has taken his first dose, O’Connor said.

Biden was slated to speak at the Unidos event in Las Vegas Wednesday afternoon as part of an effort to rally Hispanic voters ahead of the November election. Instead, he departed for the airport to fly to Delaware, where he had already been planning to spend a long weekend at his home in Rehoboth Beach.

 

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