Coronavirus threat reportedly 'hit home' for Trump after a close friend was hospitalized

Donald Trump.
(Image credit: Win McNamee/Getty Images)

President Trump reportedly disengaged from his plan to re-open the United States economy by April 12 in part because he was shaken by a personal connection to the novel COVID-19 coronavirus, Vanity Fair reports.

In March, Trump learned that his friend, 78-year-old real estate mogul Stan Chera, was in a coma at a New York hospital after falling ill with COVID-19. "Boy, did that hit home," prominent New York Trump donor Bill White told Vanity Fair. "Stan is like one of his best friends."

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Tim O'Donnell

Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.