First lady tests positive for Covid

First lady Jill Biden on Tuesday tested positive for Covid-19, coming down with the virus roughly a week after the president ended isolation for his own rebound case.

Biden had tested negative for Covid on Monday during her regular testing cadence, her communications director Elizabeth Alexander announced in a statement Tuesday. But the first lady began developing cold-like systems later Monday evening, when she checked again and a PCR test returned positive results.

“The First Lady is double-vaccinated, twice boosted, and only experiencing mild symptoms,” Alexander said in the statement.

Alexander said the first lady was prescribed a course of Paxlovid, an antiviral pill that President Joe Biden was also prescribed when he tested positive for Covid in late July. The president initially tested positive for the virus on July 21 but later experienced rebound positivity on July 30, a phenomenon that happens in some Paxlovid patients. After two consecutive negative tests, the president ended his isolation last week.

The first lady’s positive result comes on the heels of the Bidens’ family vacation to Kiawah Island, S.C., and as they were due to touch back down in Washington later Tuesday.

The first lady will stay in South Carolina to self-isolate for at least five days and will return home after she receives two consecutive negative tests, Alexander said. The president tested negative for Covid on Tuesday and will return to Washington per his schedule, a White House spokesperson said in a statement. The president is scheduled to sign the Inflation Reduction Act later Tuesday.

As he boarded Air Force One at Charleston Air Force Base on Tuesday afternoon, Biden gave a thumbs up when asked by reporters how the first lady was doing.

The White House did not immediately return a request for comment on whether Biden would alter his schedule based on the first lady’s positive Covid result.

“Consistent with CDC guidance because he is a close contact of the First Lady, he will mask for 10 days when indoors and in close proximity to others. We will also increase the President's testing cadence and report those results,” the White House spokesperson said.