While Clinton coughs, stumbles, Trump stays unusually quiet
WASHINGTON — For nearly 24 hours, Donald Trump was quiet.
As Hillary Clinton waded through the most perilous stretch of her campaign to date, the GOP presidential nominee held his tongue, allowing amateur footage of his foe stumbling after falling ill to play over and over on TV without his commentary.
The episode underscored a new political reality: After more than a year of off-the-cuff comments and chaotic cleanup, Trump’s campaign seems to have found its footing.
Over the past four weeks, with a new leadership team in place, Trump has largely done away with his free-wheeling rallies, replacing them with teleprompter-guided speeches. While he is by no means a typical candidate — he derisively referred to Sen. Elizabeth Warren as “Pocahontas” and questioned the integrity of the FBI and Department of Justice during a morning show call-in on Monday — he has nonetheless refined many of his campaign’s rougher edges. He’s trying to broaden his appeal and win over the moderate and independent voters he’ll need if he hopes to win.
Gone are the endless attacks on his former GOP rivals and his aversion to more intimate campaign events. He has even lifted his extraordinary ban on credentialing particular news outlets he’s deemed unfair.
And on the worst weekend of Hillary Clinton’s year, Trump stayed largely silent and let her problems make the headlines.
Trump’s team had already imposed a day of silence order for Sept. 11, asking supporters to refrain from news interviews and suspending outright campaigning as the nation marked the anniversary of the attacks on the Twin Towers and Pentagon.
But Team Trump even kept quiet Sunday as the news dripped out about Clinton — confusion about where she'd gone after feeling “overheated,” video of her needing assistance and then stumbling while entering a van, her campaign’s eventual revelation she’d been diagnosed with pneumonia.
There were no gloating tweets, no “told-you-so’s” from supporters who’ve been pushing conspiracy theories about her health.
When Trump re-emerged, in a pair of early-morning phone interviews with friendly TV stations, he was restrained and reserved, at least on the topic of Clinton’s health.
“Something's going on,” he said on Fox and Friends, but I just hope she gets well and gets back on the trail and we’ll be seeing her at the debate.”
Clinton abruptly left a 9-11 anniversary event Sunday in New York and was seen on video stumbling and being held up by aides. After roughly 90 minutes of silence from her campaign, aides said Clinton left because she was overheated. Several hours later, her doctor acknowledged she had been diagnosed with pneumonia two days earlier.
“In retrospect, we could have handled it better,” Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon said Monday. He pledged to release “additional medical information” about Clinton in the next few days.
Clinton spent Monday at her home in Chappaqua, N.Y., after cancelling a fundraising trip in California. It was unclear when she planned to return to the campaign trail.
Trump’s tone surprised even long-time supporters like Barry Bennett, a former adviser to his campaign.
“That's the most remarkable thing I’ve seen out of the Trump campaign so far,” said Bennett, adding that, “the old Donald Trump would have gone straight to Twitter.”
Jason Miller, Trump’s senior communications adviser, credited the discipline to Trump himself, saying that, after months of campaigning, the political novice has seen what works.
“What he’s finding now are the best ways to articulate and implement his vision,” Miller said, describing the strategy as "letting Trump be Trump, but with discipline.”