HENRICO COUNTY, Va. -- Democratic Vice Presidential Candidate Tim Kaine departed Richmond aboard a campaign plane that now has his name on it.
On Monday, Kaine greeted his flight crew before boarding the plane, bound for Dayton, Ohio.
He headed out alone after Dem. Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton left a 9/11 commemoration ceremony early after "overheating" and having to be helped into a van after faltering Sunday.
After 5 p.m. ET, her campaign released a statement saying Clinton was diagnosed Friday with pneumonia.
"On Friday, she made a decision with her doctors to just power through this," campaign manager Robbie Mook said when pressed on why the campaign hadn't disclosed that diagnosis at the time.
"Obviously pneumonia is more serious than a cold or the flu, but often people continue to go in to work and power through" with pneumonia, Mook said.
"If it was up to her, she would be out there right now, continuing to campaign. But we definitely think it's the right thing for her to have some down time, get over this and get back over there," he added.
Kaine said that Clinton’s energy is astounding.
“Within a few minutes after I heard the news I had reached out to communicate to her and she reached right back to me, said ‘no I'm going to be fine’ and then she made fun of me for reading endless debate prep memos books and she said ‘you know, our staffs know how to kill a lot of trees by putting together massive books,’” Kaine said.
“I've just been on the campaign since July 22. Hillary Clinton has been on the campaign trail for 18 months,” he added. “Her energy staggers me.”
“She'll be a fantastic president,” Kaine added .
Local Republicans echoed the response by GOP Presidential nominee Donald Trump, wishing Clinton a speedy recovery. Still, they pointed to the handling of Sunday's incident as evidence of a larger problem with transparency with the Clinton Camp.
"Secretary Clinton and Senator Kaine need to face the press more often. The fact that they don't, and will go to such lengths to keep even our local Richmond, Virginia, press from talking to the candidates, that says a lot," said Garren Shipley, RNC Virginia Communciation Director.
Kaine did not address the media prior to leaving Richmond. That's not a big deal to local Clinton supporter Rodney Hall, who has a different theory for why the Sunday incident has risen to the level of controversy.
"A lot of times its because she's a female, to be honest with you. A lot of times its simply bias," said Hall.
