The inside story on why Carter left

• The Bite May 11, 2015

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Here is a report from Atlanta journalist Scott Light who says Jimmy Carter told him he had a virus …

 

GEORGETOWN, GUYANA (CBS46) – I was out. In the land of Nod. On a rocket ship to REM sleep around 11:15pm Saturday night after a 14 hour day of news gathering in Guyana. I didn’t hear the phone ring in my hotel room and my work phone was on vibrate.

Thank goodness CBS46 photographer Eric Carlton wrapped on my door with a lumberjack’s knock just after midnight. My ears kicked in to my brain then my legs and I swung out of bed. I answered the door and Eric said “Call Deanna immediately. Something’s up.” (Deanna Congileo is President Carter’s press secretary)

I did and the gravity of the situation was immediate. I was told President Carter was leaving Guyana Sunday morning. He was going home. He would not be staying for Monday’s historic elections where he himself would be observing The Carter Center’s 100th election worldwide.

My mind went racing. What in the world had happened? I was on a need to know basis and Deanna could only say the president wasn’t feeling well and his security/medical staff determined he should return to Atlanta. Eric and I could only share this information with our newsroom managers and no one else as this situation was very fluid. By this time, it was 12:30a.m. and I was awake like – late night term paper in college – awake. Exhausted but fueled by adrenaline knowing there was a lot more to do and decisions to be made.

We could fly back on the charter with the president but his staff needed to know in 15 minutes. It was either charter Sunday or fly commercial on Tuesday after Monday’s elections. I proceeded to wake up our newsroom managers and minutes later, the decision was set. We’d fly back on the charter with President Carter Sunday. As in, a few hours.

Once I hung up the phone with Deanna, Eric and I just stared off in different directions in my room, silent, wondering what happened. You can’t help but think, President Carter is 90 and has the energy of someone half his age.

Was he exhausted or something really serious? I thought about our flight to Guyana. He came to the back of the plane and talked to us for 30 minutes plus. A great visit. What would we see Sunday on the flight back though? I pictured everything from him lying there getting intravenous fluids to sitting in his seat like nothing happened.

Again, the mind races when the unknowns involve a former president in a foreign country, drastic travel changes and an exchange of phone calls at a time when ALL of us should have been in Dreamland USA.

In the meantime, the clock was ticking. It’s past 1:15 by this time. There was more for Eric and me to do in the overnight hours. We had to have our passports to Secret Service by 8 a.m Sunday. Our equipment, which tipped the scales at 200 pounds had to be there by 9:45a.m.

So Eric went back to his room to organize and pack gear. He went to bed around 3 a.m. The plan for me was to pack my bags and get our passports to Secret Service in some six hours. My adrenaline finally started to subside and I crashed around 2:15.

It took the alarm clock, a wake-up call and I-phone alarm to get me up by 7:15. I got the passports to Secret Service and our gear came next. We were then informed we’d actually join the motorcade to get to the airport. Departure time – 10:30.

And here’s the kicker. Sunday morning, I see President Carter walking down the hallway of his hotel in dress pants, a tie and blazer around 9:30 a.m..

Here’s a former president who’s been ordered by his security/medical team to return home and he’s walking to meet a former president of Guyana, the current president and his main political challenger . Carter is indefatigable.

He wrapped his meetings, walked a short distance to the hotel exit, climbed in a Chevy Suburban and the motorcade was off. 10:30. Right on time. Eric and I hopped in a Nissan Pathfinder that in Guyana is called an ‘X-Trail’. A Guyanese police car led the motorcade followed by the Suburban, two Toyota Land Cruisers, our Nissan and a trailing Guyanese police car.

They were running lights and sirens and it was THE coolest ride to the airport in my lifetime. NO traffic. Everyone pulls over to let the motorcade through. Forty-five minutes later, we pull onto the tarmac 30 feet from our next ride. A Gulfstream 4 charter jet.

We board the plane and head back to Atlanta. Mr. Carter didn’t come back and chat with us this time. However, once we landed at Peachtree-Dekalb Airport, he let a little tidbit slip. As Eric and I were trying to shimmy past him in tight quarters of the plane, he said, “I don’t want anyone else to get my virus.”

So there you go. It’s a virus. I asked Deanna if Mr. Carter would see a doctor immediately upon his return. She said that wasn’t needed and once on the ground he was going back to The Carter Center to continue his day. Working. Again, he’s inexhaustible. At 90.

Of course, the best news out of all of this is the former president seems to be just fine even with a virus. He stopped for pictures on the tarmac with police officers and Eric and I snapped one there too. I’m sure he’s disappointed he had to leave Guyana given it’s such an historic milestone for The Carter Center.

However, he has yet another story to tell about his worldly travels and I have a story to tell about what it was like to get a world leader home. And in a hurry