US senator Mitch McConnell on Sunday revealed for the first time that a fall led to his hospitalization, breaking the silence about the Kentucky Republican’s condition after weeks of mounting speculation about his health.
McConnell, 84, said in a statement that he has undergone a battery of tests as doctors try to determine what led to his fall. He explained the long silence about his condition by saying that “folks of my generation often hesitate to share the vulnerability that comes with growing older”.
“Even in the public eye, I feel that same instinct – I can’t help it,” he said.
McConnell said he is now in a rehabilitation center and will not be returning to the Senate “quite yet”. He said he continues to work with his staff on Senate business in the meantime.
The statement included a smiling picture of the senator with his wife, Elaine Chao, a tacit response to speculation online that McConnell had died or was incapacitated. McConnell held a copy of Saturday’s Washington Post sports section in his hand.
Sunday’s statement came after his hospitalization on 14 June. McConnell’s office for weeks provided little information, insisting only that he was “receiving excellent care” and recovering.
As his hospital stay grew longer, speculation mounted about his condition. It grew so intense that Kentucky’s Democratic governor, Andy Beshear, took the extraordinary step of asking that McConnell update the public about his health in a “transparent manner”.
McConnell’s statement also came after the unexpected death of his fellow Republican US senator Lindsey Graham on Saturday evening. Graham’s office on Sunday told reporters that the 71-year-old South Carolina senator died of an aortic dissection – a break in the main artery carrying blood from the heart, caused by arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease, which causes a gradual weakening and hardening of arteries.
