Timeline of 2016 campaign after the political conventions
A timeline of major moments in the 2016 presidential primary since the Republican and Democratic parties’ national conventions in July include:
July 22: WikiLeaks releases 20,000 emails from the Democratic National Committee dated between 2015 and May 2016. The emails show efforts to hurt the candidacy of Democratic primary contender Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and help Hillary Clinton when the committee was supposed to be evenhanded.
July 30: Khizr Khan makes an emotional speech at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia about his son, a U.S. soldier killed in Iraq who won the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. Khan said Trump’s anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant statements is “totally unfit for the leadership of this beautiful country … ” Trump questions why Khan’s wife, standing at his side, didn’t speak (she would later say emotion overtook her on stage). “I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices,” Trump told ABC News in a reaction that drew widespread criticism.
Aug. 4: House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Trump’s criticism of the Gold Star parents is “beyond the pale.”
Aug. 4: Green Party nominee Jill Stein enters the presidential race and says Sanders could lead the minor party if he chooses. Sanders continues to suspend his Democratic campaign and seek to help Clinton defeat Trump.
Aug. 9: Trump says Second Amendment people may have to stop Clinton, but amid an uproar denies that was a suggestion that she be assassinated.
Aug. 10: Trump says President Barack Obama founded ISIS: “He’s the founder of ISIS.”
Aug. 12: Clinton releases her 2015 income tax returns and criticizes Trump for refusing to release his in accordance with a tradition for presidential candidates. Trump maintains that he is advised by his lawyers not to release the returns because he says they are under a routine audit.
Aug. 16: The FBI turns over to Congress its files on the investigation of Clinton’s use of a personal email server for official business while secretary of state. The State Department said all emails ordered for release can’t be vetted and provided before Election Day.
Aug. 17: Trailing in polls in battleground states, Trump shakes up his campaign staff again. He appoints conservative media executive Stephen K. Bannon of Breitbart News as his campaign’s CEO and names Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway as campaign manager.
Aug. 18: Former President Bill Clinton announces that he would resign from the Clinton Foundation and that the charity would no longer accept donations from foreign countries if his wife wins the presidency. The reduced role of the foundation comes amid press reports that donations were made by many people who met with Hillary Clinton in official visits with the secretary of state.
Aug. 18: Trump tells African-American voters that Clinton and the Democratic Party have taken their votes for granted and left them in crime-riddled neighborhoods with poor education. “What the hell do you have to lose?” he implores.
Aug. 25: Clinton says Trump “is taking a hate movement mainstream.” Trump calls Clinton “a bigot.”
Aug. 31: Trump makes a surprise visit to Mexico and speaks privately with President Enrique Peña Nieto. Trump says he discussed his plan to build a wall at the Mexican border, but didn’t discuss his promise to make Mexico pay for it. The president says he told Trump that Mexico would not pay for the wall.
Sept. 5: Clinton ends her monthslong record of refusing to hold press confrences by meeting with reporters briefly aboard her campaign plane.
Sept. 6: Clinton says Trump “clearly has something to hide” by refusing to release his income tax returns. Trump says he can’t release them while he’s being audited.
Sept. 10: Clinton takes on Trump supporters: “You could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables . . . the racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic — you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up.”
Sept. 11: Clinton stumbles and is helped to her car at the 9/11 commemoration in lower Manhattan and appears shortly afterward, but won’t tell reporters what happened. Her staff later blamed the incident on pneumonia and dehydration.
Sept. 12: Trump demands Clinton apologize for her “deplorables” comment and says she slandered millions of Americans.
Sept. 13: Stumping for Clinton, Obama says of Trump: “This isn’t Abraham Lincoln’s Republican Party. This isn’t even the vision of freedom of Ronald Reagan. This is a dark vision.”
Sept. 14: At a taping of the “Dr. Oz” show, Trump hands Dr. Mehmet Oz a one-page summary of his most recent physical the exam, which was conducted by Dr. Harold N. Bornstein.
Sept. 24: Clinton’s campaign says it will have billionaire Mark Cuban, a vociferous opponent of Trump, sit in the front row of the Hofstra debate. Trump tweets that he will then invite Gennifer Flowers, who famously had an affair with Bill Clinton decades ago, to sit in the front row.
Sept. 25: Clinton and Trump each meet privately with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Sept. 26: First presidential debate is scheduled for Hofstra University in Hempstead.
Oct. 4: Vice presidential debate is scheduled for Longwood University in Virginia.
Oct. 9: Second presidential debate scheduled for Washington University in St. Louis.
Oct. 19: Final presidential debate is scheduled for the University of Nevada at Las Vegas.
Nov. 8: Election Day.
Dec. 19: Electors in the Electoral College meet in Albany and other state capitols to choose the president and vice president.
Michael Gormley has worked for Newsday since 2013, covering state government, politics and issues. He has covered Albany since 2001.
Updated now Newsday travel writer Scott Vogel took the ferry over to Block Island for a weekend of fun.
Updated now Newsday travel writer Scott Vogel took the ferry over to Block Island for a weekend of fun.
