WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday, the latest in a string of high-ranking officials in Washington to receive the diagnosis this week.
Pelosi, 82, is asymptomatic, according to her spokesman, Drew Hammill.
The diagnosis came Thursday morning, one day after Pelosi appeared at the White House with President Biden as he signed a postal reform bill. She huddled with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., and nearly a dozen other lawmakers behind Biden as he signed the bill.
None of them were masked.
“The Speaker is fully vaccinated and boosted, and is thankful for the robust protection the vaccine has provided,” Hammill said. “The Speaker will quarantine consistent with CDC guidance, and encourages everyone to get vaccinated, boosted and test regularly.”
Pelosi, who is second in the presidential line of succession, is the most senior official in the line to announce a positive COVID test this year.
On Wednesday, Vice President Kamala Harris’ communications director tested positive, the second close contact of the vice president to become infected in less than a month. Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, tested positive in March.
Earlier this week, Attorney General Merrick Garland and Gina Raimondo, the secretary of Commerce, announced positive test results. Reps. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., Scott Peters, D-Calif., Katherine Clark, D-Mass., and Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, did also.
Many of the diagnoses came following the officials’ attendance at Saturday night’s Gridiron dinner, a traditional white-tie gathering of reporters and politicians.
