Harris considered close contact of Biden after COVID-19 positive test

Vice President Harris is being considered a close contact to President Biden, who tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday, a White House official told The Hill.  

There are no changes to her schedule, the official added.

The White House earlier on Thursday would not answer questions about who was considered a close contact of the president, saying they were in the process of making such a determination. They also would not reveal whether other West Wing staff had tested positive over the last few days or where Biden may have contracted the virus.

Biden tested positive during what the White House said was a routine test on Thursday morning after he “felt some amount of fatigue” the evening prior and “had a bit of a restless night,” COVID-19 coordinator Ashish Jha told reporters.

Biden and Harris were last together on Tuesday to receive the president’s daily brief in the morning, according to the president’s schedule.

The two were not together on Wednesday, according to the schedule, because the president went to Somerset, Mass., for a visit focused on his climate agenda and Harris was in Washington with no public events.

The White House maintains its protocol is that to be considered close contact, a person must be within six feet of another for a period of longer than 15 minutes, citing guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

On Thursday, Harris traveled to North Carolina to deliver remarks on high-speed internet and to meet with about a dozen state legislators, abortion providers and the CEO of Planned Parenthood South Atlantic for the roundtable on reproductive rights. 

She has traveled multiple times over the last week, including for meetings with state legislators and reproductive rights advocates in New Jersey on Monday, Philadelphia on Saturday and Florida last week. 

Harris, who is fully vaccinated and boosted, had tested positive for COVID-19 in April and isolated at home for several days.