The no-transparency election

The 2016 election is setting new lows for presidential transparency in the modern era.

Hillary Clinton is under fire for waiting until she nearly collapsed at a public event Sunday to disclose she was diagnosed Friday with pneumonia. She hasn’t provided a full accounting of her health, though Donald Trump has revealed far less. The Republican nominee is departing with decades of tradition by not releasing his tax returns, which could provide key details about his investments and financial interests. And both candidates have declined traveling with a “protective pool” of reporters that follow them to provide continuous coverage of their activities.

Trump, campaign take measured response on Clinton health news

On Monday night, transparency questions surfaced again as PBS interviewer Charlie Rose grilled former President Bill Clinton about his family’s foundation.

In other words, Trump and Clinton have less than two months to close the sale, but most voters aren’t sure exactly what they’re buying.

Few candidates relish throwing open their most intimate health and financial secrets. But the issue is particularly acute this year given Trump’s decades of business dealings. And, of course, Trump, 70, and Clinton, 68, would be the oldest and second oldest presidents inaugurated for a first term in a job that comes with intense physical and mental demands – making their health a highly relevant issue.

When asked by CNN’s Anderson Cooper Monday why she kept her pneumonia diagnosis secret, Clinton said she “just didn’t think it was going to be that big a deal.”

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Amanpour: Can't a girl have a sick day?

“It’s just the kind of thing that if it happens to you and you’re a busy active person, you keep moving forward,” she said. “I think it’s fair to say, Anderson, that people know more about me than almost anyone in public life. They’ve got 40 years of my tax returns, tens of thousands of emails, a detailed medical letter report, all kinds of personal details.”

Clinton campaign manager: Staff to blame for slow health disclosure

Trump has said he will soon release details of a physical exam he underwent last week. In an interview Monday with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room,” Republican vice presidential nominee Mike Pence said both candidates should release detailed medical information.

Hillary Clinton accepts the Democratic Party's nomination for president at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia on July 28, 2016. The former first lady, U.S. senator and secretary of state was the first woman to lead the presidential ticket of a major political party.

Before marrying Bill Clinton, she was Hillary Rodham. Here she attends Wellesley College in Massachusetts. Her commencement speech at Wellesley's graduation ceremony in 1969 attracted national attention. After graduating, she attended Yale Law School.

Rodham was a lawyer on the House Judiciary Committee, whose work led to impeachment charges against President Richard Nixon in 1974.

In 1975, Rodham married Bill Clinton, whom she met at Yale Law School. He became the governor of Arkansas in 1978. In 1980, the couple had a daughter, Chelsea.

Arkansas' first lady, now using the name Hillary Rodham Clinton, wears her inaugural ball gown in 1985.

The Clintons celebrate Bill's inauguration in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1991. He was governor from 1983 to 1992, when he was elected President.

Bill Clinton comforts his wife on the set of "60 Minutes" after a stage light broke loose from the ceiling and knocked her down in January 1992.

In June 1992, Clinton uses a sewing machine designed to eliminate back and wrist strain. She had just given a speech at a convention of the International Ladies' Garment Workers Union.

During the 1992 presidential campaign, Clinton jokes with her husband's running mate, Al Gore, and Gore's wife, Tipper, aboard a campaign bus.

Clinton accompanies her husband as he takes the oath of office in January 1993.

The Clintons share a laugh on Capitol Hill in 1993.

Clinton unveils the renovated Blue Room of the White House in 1995.

Clinton waves to the media in January 1996 as she arrives for an appearance before a grand jury in Washington. The first lady was subpoenaed to testify as a witness in the investigation of the Whitewater land deal in Arkansas. The Clintons' business investment was investigated, but ultimately they were cleared of any wrongdoing.

The Clintons hug as Bill is sworn in for a second term as President.

The first lady holds up a Grammy Award, which she won for her audiobook "It Takes a Village" in 1997.

The Clintons dance on a beach in the U.S. Virgin Islands in January 1998. Later that month, Bill Clinton was accused of having a sexual relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Clinton looks on as her husband discusses the Monica Lewinsky scandal in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on January 26, 1998. Clinton declared, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman." In August of that year, Clinton testified before a grand jury and admitted to having "inappropriate intimate contact" with Lewinsky, but he said it did not constitute sexual relations because they had not had intercourse. He was impeached in December on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.

The first family walks with their dog, Buddy, as they leave the White House for a vacation in August 1998.

President Clinton makes a statement at the White House in December 1998, thanking members of Congress who voted against his impeachment. The Senate trial ended with an acquittal in February 1999.

Clinton announces in February 2000 that she will seek the U.S. Senate seat in New York. She was elected later that year.

Clinton makes her first appearance on the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee.

Sen. Clinton comforts Maren Sarkarat, a woman who lost her husband in the September 11 terrorist attacks, during a ground-zero memorial in October 2001.

Clinton holds up her book "Living History" before a signing in Auburn Hills, Michigan, in 2003.

Clinton and another presidential hopeful, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, applaud at the start of a Democratic debate in 2007.

Obama and Clinton talk on the plane on their way to a rally in Unity, New Hampshire, in June 2008. She had recently ended her presidential campaign and endorsed Obama.

Obama is flanked by Clinton and Vice President-elect Joe Biden at a news conference in Chicago in December 2008. He had designated Clinton to be his secretary of state.

Clinton, as secretary of state, greets Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin during a meeting just outside Moscow in March 2010.

The Clintons pose on the day of Chelsea's wedding to Marc Mezvinsky in July 2010.

In this photo provided by the White House, Obama, Clinton, Biden and other members of the national security team receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in May 2011.

Clinton checks her Blackberry inside a military plane after leaving Malta in October 2011. In 2015, The New York Times reported that Clinton exclusively used a personal email account during her time as secretary of state. The account, fed through its own server, raises security and preservation concerns. Clinton later said she used a private domain out of "convenience," but admits in retrospect "it would have been better" to use multiple emails.

Clinton arrives for a group photo before a forum with the Gulf Cooperation Council in March 2012. The forum was held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.