A question about the continuing violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo took an unexpected turn at the White House when President Donald Trump suddenly asked an African journalist about Ebola.
The exchange happened on September 28, 2026, in the Oval Office as Trump was taking questions from reporters.
The journalist, Hariana Verás, an Angolan White House correspondent, was asking Trump about the continued fighting between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda and whether the United States would respond to alleged violations of a peace agreement.
Trump said his administration would act if it determined that the agreement had been violated.
“We're going to stop it if there is a violation. We know about it,” Trump said during the exchange.
But Verás continued.
She told Trump that she had recently returned from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where she said she had witnessed continued killings of Congolese people.
Trump then asked her whether she had personally witnessed what she was describing.
“Yes, Mr. President. And I have evidence,” Verás replied.
Then came the moment that quickly spread across social media.
“How is Ebola? How is Ebola going?” Trump asked.
Verás answered that Ebola was under control.
She said she had spoken with the director of the World Health Organization during the United Nations meetings and had been told the outbreak was under control.
She added, however, that the country still needed help fighting Ebola — while stressing that the war remained the bigger problem.
Trump responded: “I'll make sure it works out. That's what I do. I make sure things work out.”
He then moved on to another reporter.
THE QUESTION BEFORE EBOLA
The viral clip can make the exchange look much shorter than the conversation that led to it.
Verás had been discussing the conflict in eastern Congo and Rwanda's alleged violations of the peace process.
The United States has been involved in diplomatic efforts between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda, and fighting has continued despite the peace agreement.
In the Oval Office exchange, Trump said that if there was a violation of the agreement, the United States would stop it.
Verás then pushed further, saying she had just returned from Congo and had witnessed continued killings.
That was when Trump asked about Ebola.
The full transcript confirms that Trump, not the journalist, was the person who introduced Ebola into that part of the conversation.
WHY THE MOMENT IS GETTING SO MUCH ATTENTION
The question immediately stood out because it came directly after Verás said she had personally witnessed continued violence and had evidence.
The abrupt change from the Congo conflict to Ebola made the short exchange highly shareable, with clips spreading across social media and different commentators interpreting the moment in very different ways.
Some coverage has described Trump's question as a deflection from the Congo discussion. That is an interpretation, however, rather than something that can be established simply from the transcript.
What can be established is the sequence of events: Verás raised the continued violence in Congo, said she had witnessed killings and had evidence, and Trump then asked, “How is Ebola going?”
EBOLA IS ALSO A REAL CRISIS IN CONGO
The Ebola reference was not completely unrelated to events in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The country is dealing with an Ebola outbreak, and the health crisis has complicated an already difficult situation in parts of the country affected by conflict.
That makes the exchange particularly striking: two separate crises — the continuing conflict and the Ebola outbreak — collided in a brief White House conversation.
THE MOMENT THAT PEOPLE ARE DEBATING
The clip has now become one of those brief political moments that is being discussed far beyond the original conversation.
But beneath the viral question are two much larger issues.
The first is the continuing conflict in eastern Congo and the difficult implementation of the Congo-Rwanda peace process.
The second is the Ebola outbreak and the challenge of controlling a serious health emergency while parts of the country continue to face insecurity.
For Verás, the central issue she was trying to raise remained the violence in Congo.
For Trump, the exchange ended with his assurance that he would make sure the situation worked out.
The viral question, however, has become the part of the conversation that many people are now talking about online.
“How is Ebola going?”
