During a routine Wednesday press conference, Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell, 81, left tongues wagging after he froze mid-sentence for nearly thirty seconds before aides escorted him away from the microphones.
It was just the latest in a string of health-related incidents the senator has suffered this year, which marked the longest-ever tenure of a Senate leader. In March, after McConnell tripped and fell at the Waldorf Astoria in Washington, he spent five days in the hospital and more than a week in a rehab facility dealing with a concussion and broken rib. All in all, he spent nearly six weeks away from the Senate.
Also of note: Just days before the March incident, McConnell stumbled and fell in the snow on his way to a meeting with the Finnish President in Helsinki, CNN reported Thursday. And late Wednesday night, NBC News reported that McConnell tripped and fell again earlier this month while disembarking from a plane in DC. Both of these stumbles had previously gone unreported.
When McConnell returned to the podium Wednesday, he dodged a question about whether the most recent episode was related to his concussion, simply saying he was “fine” and that he was able to continue fulfilling his duties. His reticence on the subject of his own health is hardly surprising: One Republican senator, speaking anonymously to NBC News, said that McConnell “doesn’t address” his medical issues even in closed-door GOP meetings.
But there’s reason to believe the incident might point to something more serious. Two neurologists who spoke to The New York Times after the incident said the two most likely causes of the episode were a partial seizure or a kind of mini-stroke called a “transient ischemic attack.” McConnell aides have declined to say whether he’d been examined by a doctor.
McConnell’s health issues underscore the challenges faced by a rapidly aging Senate. This spring, California Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein, who last month celebrated her 90th birthday, spent over two months away from her duties while recovering from a bout of shingles. At times, she has shown significant signs of possible cognitive impairment, leading to calls for her resignation.
The median age in the Senate is currently 65.3, up from 62.4 in 2017 and over seven years older than the median House age, which has fallen in recent years. More than half of the Senate’s Republicans are older than 65, compared to 46 percent of Senate Democrats. In the United States, the full retirement age is 67.
As for McConnell, a number of pro-Trump conservative media figures and activists, who have long despised the Senate minority leader, called for his immediate resignation Wednesday. But the Kentucky Senator laughed off a question about his potential replacement.
Still, the senator’s obvious frailty means that a retirement or retreat from Senate leadership is certainly a possibility. That scenario would likely touch off a three-way succession race between Senate Republican Whip John Thune, Wyoming Senator John Barrasso, and former Senate GOP whip John Cornyn. Barrasso, an orthopedic surgeon who helped escort McConnell back to his office on Wednesday, said the Senate GOP leader is “doing a great job leading our conference and was able to answer every question the press asked him today.” Cornyn likewise said Wednesday that he’d support McConnell “as long as he wants to remain as leader.”
Succession would be fairly simple in McConnell’s home state. In 2021, the GOP-dominated Kentucky legislature overrode Democratic Governor Andy Beshear’s veto to pass a law mandating that McConnell’s replacement would have to come from his own party. McConnell publicly supported the bill, which prompted speculation that he was planning on leaving the Senate before the end of his current term, which runs until 2027.
“I’m not going anywhere. I just got elected to a six-year term, and I’m still the leader of my party in the Senate,” McConnell said at the time. “So, this is a hypothetical. But I had watched this over the years in the Senate, as various vacancies were filled, and I thought this was the best way to go.”