Tyrone Oliver Gayle died of complications from colon cancer on Thursday at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan. He was 30.
Galye rose quickly in the world of Democratic campaign operations to work as a spokesman for Clinton's 2016 presidential bid.
He got his start in politics as a driver and body man for Tim Kaine during the Virginia Democrat's successful run for the Senate in 2012.Gayle was born in Toronto and raised in Jacksonville, Florida, where he joined his high school track team.
He also ran track as a Division I athlete at Clemson University in South Carolina, and graduated with a degree in communications in 2010.
After Gayle joined Kaine's Senate campaign, the young staffer made an impression wherever he went on the campaign trail.
'If I'd go to an event, and the next time I'd be back and Tyrone wasn't with me, everyone would want to talk about 'how come Tyrone wasn't with me, where's Tyrone?'' Kaine told the New York Times.
Over the course of the campaign, Gayle drove Kaine more than 60,000 miles across Virginia, spending 15 hour days with the candidate for over a year.
'From 7am to 10pm or later, I was driving him and staffing him, keeping him on schedule, briefing him on who he was meeting and keeping his morale up — whether that was by an early-morning hike or talking sports trivia,' Gayle recalled in a 2016 interview with People.
'I spent more time with him than his wife did during that stretch, and he spent more time with me than any of my friends did.'
After Kaine won, Gayle worked briefly for the Senate Democratic Steering and Outreach Committee.
He then joined the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee as a spokesman during the 2014 midterm elections.
Gayle joined Clinton's 2016 bid as a spokesman at her Brooklyn headquarters. He was diagnosed with colon cancer in the midst of the primary campaign.
The campaign staffer was halfway through his chemotherapy treatment when he decided to write an email to Clinton recommending his old boss Tim Kaine as her vice presidential pick.
Five days later, Clinton announced Kaine as her running mate. Gayle's cancer went into remission and he was able to rejoin the campaign that summer.
After Clinton lost the race to President Donald Trump, Gayle became press secretary to Senator Harris, who is among the discussed contenders for the 2020 Democrat presidential primary.
Kaine officiated at Galye's wedding to Beth Foster in May. The couple had met in Virginia in 2012, when he was working for Kaine and she was working for President Obama’s re-election campaign.
Gayle's cancer returned this year. His death on Thursday prompted Clinton to pay tribute in a series of tweets.
'He was one of the fiercest fighters we will ever know,' she wrote.
'Whatever he did, he did with his whole heart—whether he was running sprints, planning his wedding to the love of his life, rooting for his beloved Clemson Tigers, or working to build an America as kind, compassionate, and big-hearted as Tyrone himself.'
In addition to his wife, Gayle is survived by his father, Dr. Michael O. Gayle; his mother, Ann Gayle; and his sister, Dr. Tamara Gayle Blackwood.
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