Hillary Clinton Didn’t Think It’d Be a Big Deal

If you only read one thing: Seeking to broaden his appeal to women—among whom he faces a critical polling shortfall—Donald Trump will be joined by his daughter Ivanka Tuesday evening to unveil his maternity leave and early-childhood care policy proposals. Trump’s plan tries to ease the burden on working families, allowing most Americans to deduct the cost of care for up to four dependents while increasing deductions for stay-at-home parents and revising federal savings account rules to expand options for childcare spending. Trump will also call for mandatory six weeks of paid maternity leave through changes to unemployment insurance laws. Businesses would also be eligible for incentives if they provide on-site childcare for employees. The plan is among Trump’s most detailed proposals, owing to the influence of his daughter, but lacks clear explanation on how Trump will pay for it. A Trump aide said it’s accounted for as part of his comprehensive tax reform policy, except that proposal has been scored dramatically reduce federal revenues.

Trump laid into Clinton for her “basket of deplorables” attack on his supporters Monday, calling on her to apologize for her comments and calling her unqualified for the office. Trump’s response is in some ways the most traditional political counter-attack, and a reflection of how he’s been demonstrating a modicum of discipline on the trail in recent weeks. But with Hillary Clinton continuing her recuperation from pneumonia, Trump and his team are also peddling a falsehood—that Clinton’s campaign is policy-free. On Tuesday, a Trump aide told reporters of Clinton, “She has been basically running a policy-free issues-free campaign, frankly unprecedented in American history.” In fact, the opposite is demonstrably true, with more than 250 pages and 100,000 words of policy proposals and fact sheets generated by her team. Trump, on the other hand, lacks a commitment to policy, whose self-contradictions and vague statements show how he believes it to be more of a communications tool than a preview of what he hopes to do in the White House.

Clinton defends not telling people about her illness. Bill Clinton is a less-than-helpful surrogate. And how health reports became the standard on the campaign trail.

Here are your must reads:

Must Reads

How the 2016 Election Is Testing the Legal Standard on Corruption

Dueling charges of pay-for-play are now the norm, TIME’s Sam Frizell explains

Donald Trump Fires Back at Hillary Clinton’s ‘Basket of Deplorables’ Comment

TIME’s Maya Rhodan on his defense of his supporters

Clinton didn’t think illness was ‘going to be that big a deal’

Clinton defends herself from transparency critics [CNN]

An Unplanned Absence for Hillary Clinton at an Inopportune Time

Illness and controversy comes as she was set to reintroduce herself to voters [New York Times]

Trump Claims Yellen Is Holding Rates Low to Aid Obama

Fed officials have said politics won’t factor into when they raise interest rates again [Wall Street Journal]

Sound Off

“Well, if it is then it’s a mystery to me and all of her doctors. Rarely, on more than one occasion, over the last many, many years, the same sort of thing’s happened to her when she got severely dehydrated, and she’s worked like a demon, as you know, as Secretary of State, as a senator, and in the year since.” —Bill Clinton to CBS on Hillary Clinton’s health scare.

“I just didn’t think it was going to be that big of deal.” —Hillary Clinton to CNN on her diagnosis

Bits and Bites

NCAA pulls championship events from North Carolina over HB2 [News & Observer]

Donald Trump fans have been sending me racist, hateful messages for months. Here’s a sampling. [Cleveland.com]

Meet Donald Trump’s Most Unlikely Donor [Center for Public Integrity]

Trump and Clinton Diverge Wildly on Questions of Science Policy [TIME]

Hillary Clinton Will Release More Information About Her Health [TIME]

The Moment Presidential-Candidate Health Reports Became a Priority [TIME]

Pence declines to call David Duke ‘deplorable’ [Politico]