President Donald Trump said on Saturday that he’s considering ordering a quarantine on New York as the number of COVID-19 cases continues to skyrocket in the state.
“Some people would like to see New York quarantined because it’s a hot spot,” he told reporters during a press pool on the White House lawn. “New York, New Jersey, maybe one or two other places, certain parts of Connecticut quarantined. I’m thinking about that right now.”
Trump said the potential quarantine would be a “short term” period of two weeks.
“Restriction of travel from those places?” a reporter asked.
“Restrict travel,” Trump replied. “Because they’re having problems down in Florida, a lot of New Yorkers going down there. We don’t want that.”
It would be an “enforceable” quarantine, according to the President.
“I would rather not do it but we may need it,” he said.
Trump claimed he’d had a “good dialogue” with New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), but the governor said he wasn’t given any kind of heads-up about a possible quarantine when asked about it later.
“I didn’t speak to him about any quarantine,” Cuomo said during a press briefing held shortly after Trump’s presser on Saturday.
“No, I haven’t had those conversations,” he replied when a reporter asked if such a quarantine was a possibility. “I don’t even know what that means.”
With over 52,000 cases of COVID-19, New York has become the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. As such, Cuomo announced on Saturday that the state’s presidential primary will be pushed back from April 28 to June 23.
