Allies Insist McConnell Is Alive and Talking, but Demands Grow for ‘Proof of Life’

Despite the rumor mill kicking into high gear about Senator Mitch McConnell’s health, he is not brain dead following a medical emergency survived last month, his allies insist. The allegation, first raised by far-right activist and podcaster Laura Loomer, has spread online amid talk of stalled legislation favored by President Trump but opposed by the Kentucky Republican.Mr. McConnell, the 84-year-old former Senate GOP leader who stepped down from his leadership role in November 2024, has long suffered from health problems. Toward the end of his term as head of the Senate GOP, Mr. McConnell froze in front of reporters at two different press conferences. After a fall last year, Mr. McConnell has largely been seen using a wheelchair as his security detail moves him through the Capitol complex. Mr. McConnell and his office are well-known for being tight-lipped about his personal and professional decisions. For decades, he never spoke off-the-cuff to reporters around the halls of the Capitol and to this day, he largely refuses to make public statements on Capitol Hill in any context, favoring written statements and remarks on the Senate floor. After suffering a medical emergency at his home last month, his office insisted that he has been working from the hospital for the last three weeks while under doctors’ surveillance. On Monday, Ms. Loomer, citing an unnamed source close to the White House, claimed that Mr. McConnell is currently brain dead. She continued to make the claim throughout the day on Tuesday.Some of Mr. McConnell’s closest allies say the accusation is untrue. Three top Republicans say they spoke to Mr. McConnell via phone on Tuesday. “I spoke to my old friend Mitch McConnell this morning, the senior Senator from Kentucky. He’s still recovering in the hospital,” a friend and advisor to Mr. McConnell for more than two decades, Republican strategist Scott Jennings, wrote on X. “We talked for just shy of 20 minutes … about IRAN, UKRAINE, the unfolding situation in MAINE, my visit to the (Theodore Roosevelt) Presidential Library, and even a little bit of Senate history. I told him we want to see him back at work as soon as possible,” wrote Mr. Jennings, who later said Mr. McConnell contacted him. The Senate’s top two Republicans — Majority Leader John Thune, and Majority Whip John Barrasso — also spoke with Mr. McConnell on Tuesday, they said. Both senators’ offices say the senior lawmakers had “lengthy” conversations with Mr. McConnell as he remains in the hospital. The calls between Mr. McConnell and his allies did little to tamp down the conspiracy theories that he is on life support. Liberal commentators joked that there is a “Weekend at Bernie’s” situation going on in which Mr. McConnell is not actually alive and is being propped up by friends and allies. The joke, made famous from the 1989 comedy starring Andrew McCarthy and Jonathan Silverman, has been used recently to describe Iran’s most recently designated Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, as well as Presidents Trump and Biden.Ms. Loomer’s accusation argued that Mr. McConnell’s health status is being covered up as part of a convoluted scheme to block the SAVE America Act — a bill to require photo ID and proof of citizenship. Mr. McConnell does not support the legislation. “It’s being covered up so that we never get the Save America Act because the Never Trumpers want more trans kids and they want more illegals voting in our country!!!” Ms. Loomer wrote Tuesday. “He is a vegetable. PASS THE SAVE AMERICA ACT! Don’t let our country die with Mitch McConnell!”Tuesday night, a CNN anchor, Kasie Host, challenged Mr. Jennings to get Mr. McConnell on the phone while on-air. He declined, citing privacy reasons. Afterward, the daughter of the late Senator John McCain, Meghan McCain, added that despite all the movie references, Mr. McConnell needs to speak up in public. “In all seriousness, Senator McConnell’s staff owes it to the American public to give a real update on his health or show us some kind of proof of life. All of this is unseemly, macabre, bad for democracy and quite frankly embarrassing for the country,” she wrote on X.

Allies Insist McConnell Is Alive and Talking, but Demands Grow for ‘Proof of Life’

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