Republican McConnell hospitalized after accident
2023.03.09 13:31
Republican McConnell hospitalized after accident
By Ray Johnson
Budrigannews.com – One of Washington’s most influential figures, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, fell at a hotel on Wednesday and was taken to the hospital, according to his spokesperson.
“During a private dinner, McConnell, who is 81 and was first elected to the Senate in 1984, “tripped at a local hotel. “He has been admitted to the hospital where he is receiving treatment,” his spokesperson stated in a statement early on Thursday without providing any additional information.
A request for additional information was not immediately answered by McConnell representatives.
Throughout the years, both when Democrats held the edge and when his party held a majority in the chamber, as they do now, the Kentucky senator’s legislative skills have stymied numerous Democratic initiatives.
Democrats have criticized McConnell for a long time, particularly for his strategies that allowed Republicans to establish a 6-3 conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, such as preventing the Senate from considering Democratic nominee Barack Obama’s 2016 nomination.
He has also sparked Donald Trump’s ire, particularly for rejecting the Republican former president’s erroneous assertions that his defeat in the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden was caused by widespread voter fraud.
Despite the fact that some far-right Republicans have questioned U.S. aid for the Ukrainians, McConnell has also maintained his support for Ukraine following Russia’s invasion of the country last year.
Since Republicans now hold a slim majority in the House of Representatives, 222-213, McConnell has not participated in the discussion regarding raising the debt ceiling, leaving that to Vice President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.
In recent years, McConnell has also struggled with his health, breaking his shoulder in 2019 after falling in his Kentucky home.
McConnell is the third U.S. senator to be hospitalized in recent weeks. He is currently serving his seventh six-year term, which will end in 2026. John Fetterman, a Democrat, is receiving treatment for depression, and Diane Feinstein, also a Democrat, was released from the hospital to recover from shingles.
From 2015 to 2021, McConnell led the Senate as majority leader, and he currently leads the Senate as minority leader. In the Senate, Democrats currently hold a 51-49 majority, with three independents voting with them.
McConnell, a former Jefferson County, Kentucky, judge-executive, has contributed to the sharp rightward shift in the federal judiciary by expediting the Senate’s confirmation of Republican nominees.
McConnell was re-elected as the leader of the Senate Republicans this year. With the support of other Trump allies, including Senator Josh Hawley, the Florida senator Rick Scott challenged McConnell to lead the Republican caucus.
On Thursday, a number of his coworkers wished him well.
“Excited to see @LeaderMcConnell get back on the floor as soon as possible.” “Keeping him in our prayers and wishing him a speedy recovery,” Republican U.S. Senator Mike Rounds wrote on Twitter.
After securing a narrow majority in the elections in November of last year, House Republicans held 15 rounds of voting before electing McCarthy as speaker.
His efforts to sabotage liberal initiatives earned him the moniker “Grim Reaper,” but his absence from the Senate may exacerbate party divisions. Despite Trump’s attacks on him and his wife, Elaine Chao, McConnell has acted as a bulkhead against the “Make American Great Again” faction.
Even though he held Trump “practically and morally responsible,” McConnell ultimately voted to acquit the former president of an impeachment charge of incitement that had been approved by the House.
Trump has called McConnell an “old crow” and called him a “RINO,” or Republican in Name Only. He has also made a lot of racist comments about Chao, who was the transportation secretary under Trump but quit after the attack on Jan. 6.
Despite stating that he would support the eventual Republican nominee, McConnell has not said whether he would support Trump’s re-election bid in 2024.
