SACRAMENTO — Sacramento Hillary Clinton supporters came to her defense Monday, following an apparent health episode in which she appeared to collapse Sunday in New York City — revealing later that she’s been working through pneumonia.
Clinton’s near collapse — a physical misstep that now seems to be a political one. Clinton appeared to be limp and needed help getting back into her van during a 9/11 memorial ceremony. Her campaign announced late Sunday Clinton has pneumonia, and that doctors recommended Friday she take it easy on the campaign trail.
The episode has been re-spurring rumors from the right that she may be seriously ill and hiding it from the American public.
“I think she did what a lot of us do. She got a prognosis and tried to tough it out and go back to work. Unfortunately, she made the wrong decision,” said Steven Maviglio, Clinton’s Sacramento super delegate and former White House staffer to Bill Clinton.
Maviglio doesn’t think keeping pneumonia a secret will hurt Clinton moving forward.
“In retrospect should she have disclosed it? Probably. But she was taking a risk that she was going to get over this illness. She didn’t,” said Maviglio.
“Like a lot of people, I thought I could power through it and keep going forward and obviously that didn’t work out so well,” Clinton said on CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 Monday evening.
“I’m feeling so much better and obviously I should’ve gotten some rest sooner,” said Clinton.
“Secretary Clinton appears to have what we call community acquired pneumonia. That’s the sort of diagnosis family doctors and internists make regularly and can treat very successfully,” said William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert.
In the past, surrogates for Clinton’s opponent, Donald Trump, have suggested Clinton’s health may be an issue. His campaign’s been quiet thus far about Clinton’s near fall Sunday.
