Questions swirl around Trump’s taxes and Clinton’s health

Failures to disclose information about Donald Trump’s taxes and Hillary Clinton’s health dominated debate for another day in the US presidential race.

Pressure continued to mount on Mr Trump to disclose his tax returns, a prerequisite for a candidate running for the US presidency in the modern era.

It has also emerged that Mrs Clinton being diagnosed with pneumonia was kept secret from most of her staff out of fears that it would be exploited by her rivals.

There was a testy exchange when the Republican nominee's campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, took umbrage at a reporter's request for proof that Mr Trump was being audited by the IRS – the excuse he has given for not releasing his tax returns.

"Will Donald Trump release anything from the IRS proving that he's under audit?" asked CNN anchor Alisyn Camerota on Tuesday. "Are you calling him a liar?" Ms Conway responded. "Seriously, we're running against a Clinton, and we're going to challenge someone's veracity?"

Mrs Clinton and her running mate, Virginia senator Tim Kaine, have for months challenged Mr Trump to release his tax returns.

Her campaign has accused him of “hiding behind fake excuses and backtracking on previous promises”.

Presidential debate

Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of business networking website LinkedIn, has pledged to donate up to $5 million to US military veterans if Mr Trump releases his tax returns by October 19th, the date of the third and final presidential debate. He has promised to add his money to a $25,000 target set by a 26-year-old Marine Corps veteran Pete Kiernan.

The businessman may not be willing to release his tax returns but he has said he will release medical records from a health check-up last week as his campaign manager accused Mrs Clinton of “lying” about her pneumonia by not disclosing her illness for two days.

On Sunday the Clinton campaign disclosed that she was diagnosed with pneumonia on Friday hours after the candidate abruptly left a 9/11 memorial and was video-taped stumbling and being helped by aides and Secret Service agents into her van.

The Democrat’s team has refused to say how many aides knew about Mrs Clinton’s diagnosis beyond saying that only that “senior staff knew”.

Mr Trump has repeatedly suggested that Mrs Clinton “lacks the mental and physical stamina” to be president.

Regrettable

Former Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell told the Washington Post that the delay in revealing Mrs Clinton’s pneumonia was regrettable.

"They probably should have acknowledged her initial diagnosis," he said, adding that because Mr Trump and one of his leading supporters, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, had raised the issue of her health "so brutally", they tried to "gut it out".

Mrs Clinton's communications director Jennifer Palmieri said the candidate she did not see a need to tell people initially because she felt she was well enough to "power through".

Asked by CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Monday why she did not reveal her illness on Friday, she said: “I just didn’t think it was going to be that big a deal.”

If elected, Mr Trump (70) would be the oldest person ever to serve as president while Mrs Clinton (68) would be the second eldest, making health and the capacity of either candidate to serve in such a demanding role a major issue during this campaign.