Culture

Donald Trump, Who Has Criticized Clinton’s ‘Stamina’ For Weeks, Hopes She Feels Better Soon

The 15th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks proved quite eventful for Hillary Clinton. Not so much because of the weight of the weekend’s many memorials, per se, but due to the Democratic nominee leaving an event early after feeling “overheated.” Footage of Clinton stumbling into her vehicle only made things worse, as media outlets analyzed the video for any and all possible indications of her poor health. The campaign’s subsequent revelation of a pneumonia diagnosis didn’t help her case either.

Through it all, Donald Trump amazingly had nothing negative to say about Clinton’s health. MSNBC even gave the Republican nominee a chance to comment on camera about Clinton’s early departure and stumble, but instead of offering his two billion cents, Trump said he “didn’t know anything about it” and departed. Perhaps he was just waiting for the right moment, which presented itself Monday morning on Fox & Friends:

“I see what I see. The coughing fit was a week ago, so I assume that was pneumonia also. I would think it would have been, so something’s going on. I just hope she gets well and gets back on the trail, and we’ll be seeing her at the debate.”

Like his recent implementation of the teleprompter during campaign rally speeches, Trump’s refusal to repeat past criticisms of Clinton’s health is unexpected. Especially since he was repeatedly calling her “low energy” and describing her as having “no stamina” in an August speech about national security. As the New York Times reported, Trump argued Clinton “lacks the mental and physical stamina to take on ISIS, and all the many adversaries we face” and claimed she’d “short-circuited” at recent campaign events.

Much of this fed into alt-right conspiracy theories about Clinton’s health, and neither Trump nor his many media surrogates did much to dissuade their most ardent supporters from believing them. So Trump’s (or his campaign team’s) decision not to grasp at low-hanging fruit like Clinton’s videoed trip is telling, especially because the Republican candidate is due to release his health records shortly (albeit in a unique fashion).

As Trump told the Fox News morning program on Monday, he thinks the nominees’ health “is an issue” of concern to voters:

“This last week I took a physical. I’ll be releasing, when the numbers come in — hopefully they’re going to be good, I think they’re going to be good, I feel great — but when the numbers come in, I’ll be releasing very, very specific numbers.”

How “very, very specific numbers” translates into accurate health records for Trump remains to be seen. After all, he still hasn’t released very specific (or any) numbers for his taxes.

(Via Fox & Friends and New York Times)

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