Sen. Mitch McConnell Falls in Senate Office Basement
Just retire. Why wait until 2027?
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) took another fall.
McConnell, 83, fell in the Russell Senate Office Building while activists from the Sunrise Movement.
An assistant guided McConnell down the hallway, too, which is never a good sign.
Sen. Mitch McConnell fell in the Russell basement, while being questioned my members of The Sunrise Movement, who took this video. pic.twitter.com/BeGNEE5SgP
— Erik Rosales (@ErikRosalesNews) October 16, 2025
McConnell is retiring at the end of his term in 2027.
This isn’t the first time McConnell has fallen or shown health issues:
- Mitch McConnell Fell Down Stairs After Senate Vote
- Sen. McConnell Trips, Sprains Wrist After Fall During GOP Lunch
- For the Second Time, McConnell Appears to Freeze and Lose Ability to Speak
- McConnell Claims He’s ‘Fine’ After Freezing and Appearing Unwell at Press Conference
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
Another Congressional fossil, overdue for The Home.
Term limits now!
At least have reasonable age limits tied to something like SS retirement age plus 12 or so allowing them to increase,
That or have some sort of a physical fitness test that at the very least shows that they can walk on their own or with the assistance of a cane that they know how to use.
I’m more concerned with his mental acuity than physical fitness.
FDR (even if you disliked his politics) managed to do his job while intermittently confined to a wheelchair. We’ve had veteran officeholders who did fine with service-related injuries.
I didn’t care if Biden was unsteady on his feet, I cared if he was mentally not all there.
You bring up a good point. You are right.
The ghost of Charles Sumner would like you to remove the “cane clause.”
Yes but never forget he kept Garland off of SCOTUS. Still, it’s sad to see these people refuse to leave the building and enjoy retirement like they should.
If Presidents have term limits, why not these creatures?
Because it took a special amendment to impose them on presidents. You wanna try for a term limit amendment, go for it, but it has almost no chance of passage.
The Kentucky governor is a Democrat. Would he choose McConnell’s replacement if he retires?
Yes, but there’s…. legitimate questions about that.
The Kentucky Congress passed a law saying that the governor could only appoint somebody they approved of by a vote, but there IS reasonable legal argument that exceeds their authority and he could successfully appoint a Democrat anyway.
So the governor would undoubtedly appoint a Democrat and let the Kentucky Republicans sue him and regardless of who won it would drag on in the courts for months to settle it – which benefits Democrats because whether they win or not they won’t have a Republican vote during that time even if they can’t seat a Democrat.
Prior to the 17th Amendment it was the state legislatures – not the governors – who appointed Senators. It’s not clear in the case of a Senator’s death that the governor gets to make the choice of a temporary replacement with the state legislature having no say.
What Beshear is counting on is a #Resistance judge (Federal or state) declaring that he gets to do what he wants regardless of what the law says. You can bet Beshear already has a replacement lined up to head to DC the minute McConnell keels over.
Yes, but that’s the point. Whether Democrats actually get a D seated isn’t the goal. The goal would be to keep the seat empty for months (maybe even years) while litigation drags through the courts. Keeping a solid R seat empty while a court case drags on benefits them.
The 17th amendment says vacancies must be filled by election, but that the legislature may empower the governor to appoint a temporary replacement. Kentucky used to give its governor that power, as most states do, but as of last year it no longer does.
Could he appoint himself?
TECHNICALLY no, he can’t ‘appoint himself’, but there have been multiple times that somebody ‘resigned’ as governor, their vice governor assumed office and then immediately appointed them Senator, which is functionally the same thing.
Even technically, yes, a governor with the power to temporarily fill senate vacancies may indeed appoint himself. There is no need for this rigmarole of going through the lieutenant governor. The governor appoints himself, and then resigns. The incoming governor has no power to change it.
But in KY the governor no longer has that power.
If he had the power of appointment, which he claims the state constitution gives him, then yes, he could appoint himself. Even technically.
But last year the state legislature took that power away from him, so now there must be a special election to fill a vacancy.
KY changed the law recently to require a special election, so the seat would be vacant for a while. I don’t know how much leeway the governor has in setting the special election date.
Gov Bershear could try to appoint himself (or someone else), on the basis of the State Constution giving him that authority, but the Senate could refuse to seat the replacement on grounds it is illegal. In short, if Mitch dies soon, there will be a royal mess.
The 17th amendment says:
So the default is a special election, but the state legislature can grant the governor temporary appointment powers. The Kentucky legislature had once upon a time granted its governor such a power, but last year it repealed that, so now it’s back to the default constitutional position of a special election, with the seat remaining vacant until then.
However the Kentucky state constitution says:
Beshear claims that this includes vacancies in the US senate, and thus the law the legislature passed last year, to require a special election for senate vacancies, violates the state constitution.
He’s wrong, because US senator is not a state office, and the state constitution can’t control how vacancies are to be filled. But he could fight it and thus keep the seat open for many months.
Keep him on life support if the Kentucky Democrat would appoint an a successor
Reminds me of a John McCain response during a Presidential race:
Republican John McCain said Thursday that as president he would appoint Alan Greenspan to lead a review of the nation’s tax code – even if the former Federal Reserve chairman was dead.
“If he’s alive or dead it doesn’t matter. If he’s dead, just prop him up and put some dark glasses on him like, like ‘Weekend at Bernie’s,'” McCain joked. “Let’s get the best minds in America together and fix this tax code.”
Get these decrepit fossils OUT of the government.
We are not a freaking gerontocracy, why is the Senate a retirement home.
Stupid people voting of course. The reason for all the insanity in a democracy (or republic) always boils down to the stupid people who vote without consideration of all the factors currently at work.
It’s time for the idiots in Kentucky to stop putting the turtle on top of the fencepost.
He should move to Florida and rest belly up in the sun.
The House is also.
I believe a more salient point is why are the houses of Congress a career? That’s not what was intended.
I’m not so much for term limits as I am for mandatory retirement. Pick an age: 75, 78, 81, whatever. This nonsense of these dinosaurs glitching out, or being wheeled in on a gurney for a vote has gots to go! Mandatory retirement – because they ain’t taking themselves out of the game.
That’s a good idea. But I think term limits are too.
I vote for both.
“I’ve fallen and can’t get to my bank account,”
https://64.media.tumblr.com/dafd349ca4c9d3b0e5eb6ec7431f3302/343115a32489e6c0-ba/s1280x1920/5431987ba9824fea99f72f3e9c8513415b82587c.jpg
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-old-school-grift-of-mitch-mcconnell-and-elaine-chao
Just another example of an old fossil that can’t give it up
Great way to keep from having to answer questions. Do the fainting goat routine.
This is just sad at this point.
He’s clearly well past the time he should have said farewell but I’m sure his entire persona is being a Senator. Without that, what is there?
There are far too many elderly members of Congress that are in the same state of decline as Senator McConnell. Clearly the 17th amendment was a big mistake (as are all of the “progressive amendments “) and I’m also leaning towards term & age limits as well.
And in related news, as part of the DC renovations undertaken by the Trump administration, the Senate basement was backfilled with concrete today.
“Mitch O’Connell — He Saved DC from Hamas”
See
https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF11907
for every state’s rules on filling Senate vacancies.
We need to pass a Constitutional amendment on term limits for Congress. McConnell is like Biden.
I’d settle for at this point for a Constitutional amendment on term limits for just. McConnell
There is a proposal for a law that would create a mechanism to get rid of people like Mitch and Nancy (And Biden) when they are no longer able to function. It’s called the No Secret Rulers Act. You can read it here: https://github.com/irving/no_secret_rulers_act/blob/main/bill/NSRA.md
Note: No one has yet proposed this in congress. It’s just an idea.
Note 2: The text was written by ChatGPT (with a lot of prompting from me)
Anyway, it’s an idea.
“ McConnell, 83, fell in the Russell Senate Office Building while activists from the Sunrise Movement.”
Sentence fragments. Don’t use them. They are annoying. As hell. I’m
“Proofread carefully to see if you words out.”
I have a GREAT list of self-contradictory writing rules but it’s a bit long for a comment.
Avoid alliteration always.
Avoid colloquialisms like the plague! They are old hat.
Eschew archaisms.
Term limits or age limits are almost certainly not gonna happen. What we could get at the grassroots level is changing the political party qualifying criteria. Remember that political party affiliation is voluntary and that the political parties are private orgs which can largely regulate themselves via their membership and leadership structure. If a State level political Party adopted a qualification rule that no candidate could serve more than 3 consecutive terms or be over age 65 on swearing in that would be totally fine. The candidates who claim to be ‘harmed’ can pound sand b/c there’s no ‘harm’ to any of their Constitutional rights. No one is telling they can’t run for office or hold office if they win b/c they can seek qualification to run as independents or in another political party in the general election. If they want to run as member of X party they gotta follow the rules set by that political party.