Senator Mitch McConnell, the highest ranking Republican in the upper chamber, says he’s just fine after appearing to have some sort of seizure at the podium on July 26. Democrats cringe when they hear the excuse he uses to shrug off his senior moment. “I was sandbagged,” he quipped. That’s a reference to a recent Joe Biden face-plant, which Joe blamed on tripping over a sand bag.
Senator goes blank
It’s obvious to anyone who’s seen the clip, Senator Mitch McConnell may have been standing at the podium but he wasn’t really there. He blanked out and just stood there, until escorted someplace to go sit down for a while.
He soon came back up, his regular self, and downplayed what Americans are concerned is potentially something serious. The media is playing it safe and calling it “an unusually long pause.”
Senator McConnell “was giving an opening statement during a press conference when he abruptly stopped speaking and stood silently for several seconds.” He appeared “unable to start talking again as other senators helped him move away from the lectern.”
?PANIC: 81 Year Old Mitch McConnell stops speaking, freezes dead and has total mental health episode live on TV.
Other senators gather around McConnell and speak to him like he’s a brain damage nursing home patient.
AGE LIMITS FOR CONGRESS NOWpic.twitter.com/KAOCzqA0aa
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) July 26, 2023
The first reaction in the crowd was that it may have had something to do with a concussion he sustained a while back.
McConnell took a fall in March and was hospitalized “for a concussion he suffered from a fall at a hotel in Washington.” Once he was talking again, the senator brushed aside concerns with a confidant “No, I’m fine.”
The next question was obvious, though the timing wasn’t in the best taste, asking the 80-year-old if “he was able to able do his job,” the statesman was quick to declare “yes.”
Felt lightheaded
An aide to the senator who happened to be grilled by the press about it gave the official story and they’re sticking with it. McConnell simply “felt lightheaded and stepped away for a moment.”
When he returned to take questions, he answered several and his responses, “as everyone observed,” were “sharp.”
Later that evening, Joe Biden gave him a jingle to check in on him and see how he was doing. How thoughtful. He was hoping an opponent would be out of commission for a while. McConnell proved he might have had a seizure but he can still think faster than Joe.
After suffering a stroke on camera Mitch McConnell tries to laugh it off with a joke hastily written by his staff then proceeds to immediately freeze up again and stare off into the middle distance.
McConnell is unwell.
He is a cancer on the GOP.
Resignpic.twitter.com/nYzbNYHkJf— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) July 27, 2023
As the senator told reporters later, Biden “called to check up on me and I told him I got sandbagged.” Again when pressed against his health, he assures “I’m fine.”
It’s also been unusually hot and humid around America lately. The Capitol has been hit with some brutal weather this year. Liberals are quick to blame anything uncomfortable on climate change but really this is normal variations in the weather.
Senator McConnell will get the whole month of August off to recuperate from whatever it was, because all of Washington is on vacation for the next month.
