Trump, speaking to masked reporters in the White House Rose Garden, suggested that Pence was in quarantine after his press secretary tested positive, though he did not say it outright.

Katie Miller, the spokeswoman for Pence, who heads the White House’s coronavirus task force, tested positive for coronavirus last week along with a personal valet to Trump.

Three members of the task force have since gone into quarantine – infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci, Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Stephen Hahn, head of the Food and Drug Administration.

A Pence spokesman denied over the weekend that the vice president was also in quarantine but Trump suggested he was when asked on Monday whether he had considered limiting his contact with him.

“I would say that he and I will be talking about that,” Trump said at an occasionally testy press conference, AFP reported.

“During this quarantine period, we’ll probably talk,“ Trump said. “I have not seen him since then.”

 “We can talk on the phone,“ he said of Pence. “He tested negative, so we have to understand that, but he comes into contact with a lot of people.”

Trump sought to play down any concerns about an outbreak of the virus in the cramped quarters of the West Wing, where the president works out of the Oval Office.

“We want to keep our country running so we have a lot of people coming in and out (of the White House) and many of those people, most of those people, are tested,“ he said.

“Everybody coming into the president’s office gets tested, and I’ve felt no vulnerability whatsoever,“ he said.

Trump, who is desperately seeking to reboot the economy ahead of the November election, said the US was making “tremendous strides” in ramping up testing and the number of virus infections is “coming down very rapidly.”

He said it was essential to get the country reopened.

“The people want our country open,“ the president said.

“Some states could be moving more quickly,“ he said. “People are dying in the lockdown position too.”

Trump abruptly ended the press conference after an exchange with a CBS News reporter who asked him why when Americans were losing their lives did he keep insisting that the US was doing better than other countries when it came to testing.

“Well, they’re losing their lives everywhere in the world,“ Trump said. “And maybe that’s a question you should ask China. Don’t ask me, ask China that question, OK?”

The CBS reporter, Weijia Jiang, who is of Chinese-American origin, than asked Trump “Sir, why are you saying that to me specifically?”

“I’m telling. I’m saying it to anybody who would ask a nasty question like that, “Trump replied before abruptly ending the press conference.

Though it may appear spacious in movies and TV shows, the West Wing is actually rather cramped, making social distancing difficult.

It houses not just the president’s office but also those of some of his closest advisers, the press briefing room and the desks of White House correspondents, who work elbow to elbow.

Kevin Hassett, a senior economic advisor to the president, told CBS over the weekend that it is “scary to go to work.”

“I would be safer sitting at home in my house than going into a West Wing that with even all the testing in the world and the best medical team on Earth, is a relatively crammed place,“ Hassett told another network, CNN.

In a memo issued on Monday, the White House instructed all staff to wear a mask when inside the West Wing, except when at their desks.

Unlike a number of other world leaders, the 73-year-old Trump has not been wearing a mask in public.

He said Monday that Americans have “learned about face masks.”

“The good and the bad, by the way,“ he said.

“It’s not a one-sided thing, believe it or not,“ Trump said without elaborating.

The United States is the country the hardest-hit by the virus with more than 80,000 deaths and 1.3 million infections.

The post Trump Dismisses Concern over Coronavirus Outbreak in White House appeared first on Iran News Daily.

US Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday Washington would soon unveil its “toughest sanctions ever” on North Korea, adding that the regime in Pyongyang would not be allowed to “hijack” the upcoming Olympics.

Speaking in Japan before attending the opening ceremony of the Winter Games in South Korea, Pence pledged that Washington would “intensify its maximum pressure campaign” on the North, working with Tokyo.

“I’m announcing today that the United States will soon unveil the toughest and most aggressive round of economic sanctions on North Korea ever,” he said, without giving further details.

Pence’s three-day visit to Japan came as Washington seeks to bolster ties with its allies in the region and maintain pressure on the regime in Pyongyang despite a recent thaw on the peninsula.

“All options are on the table and the US has deployed some of our most advanced military assets to Japan and the wider region to protect our homeland and our allies and we will continue to,” vowed Pence.

To highlight what Washington calls the regime’s human rights “abuses”, the vice president will attend the opening ceremony of the Pyeongchang Olympics with the father of the late former North Korea prisoner Otto Warmbier.

The US and North Korea have been locked in a fierce war of words, with US President Donald Trump mocking North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un as “rocket man” and the young dictator threatening to rain nuclear destruction on the United States.

But Kim has taken a more conciliatory tone in 2018, calling for detente with the South Koreans and accepting an invitation for his country to participate in what is being billed as the “peace Olympics.”

The two Koreas held a rare high-level meeting last month and the North’s ceremonial head of state is due to arrive Friday, the highest-ranking Pyongyang official ever to visit the South.

Nevertheless, the peninsula remains tense, with the North slamming anti-Pyongyang activists who protested against its participation as a “spasm of psychopaths.”

For his part, Abe said that Japan and the US had “confirmed… that we can never accept a nuclear-armed North Korea.”

“I appreciate the North-South talks toward the success of the Pyeongchang Olympics. But on the other hand, we must squarely face the fact that North Korea continues to pursue nuclear and missile programmes.”

Abe added that the allies would urge other countries not to be “captivated by the charm offensive of North Korea.”

“A major military parade is expected in Pyongyang tomorrow. Provocative actions are continuing,” he said.

– ‘Hijack the Games’ –

However, he appeared to take a tougher line in Tokyo, saying that North Korea must not be allowed to “hijack the message and imagery of the Olympic Games.”

“We will not allow North Korea to hide behind the Olympic banner the reality that they enslave their people and threaten the wider region,” he said.

It is not clear how long any respite in tensions will last after the Games, especially when the United States and South Korea resume their delayed joint annual military exercises, a perennial irritant for Pyongyang.

North Korea’s official KCNA news agency warned on Tuesday the resumption of the drills will throw the Korean peninsula back to “the grim phase of catastrophe”.

Earlier Wednesday, Pence inspected Japan’s missile defence system and stressed the “unwavering” commitment to what he called a “critical” alliance.

He will address troops at a US air base outside Tokyo on Thursday before heading on to South Korea.

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