US Senate Republican leader in hospital after dinner event fall

One of America’s most powerful politicians is being treated in hospital after suffering a concussion in the US capital.

Mitch McConnell, who is the Republican leader in the Senate – the upper chamber of Congress – tripped and fell at a hotel on Wednesday evening.

The 81-year-old had been at the Waldorf Astoria Washington DC attending a private dinner for the Senate Leadership Fund, a campaign committee he is linked with.

The Kentucky senator is due to stay in hospital for a “few days of observation and treatment”, his spokesman David Popp said.

Mr McConnell “is grateful to the medical professionals for their care and to his colleagues for their warm wishes”, he added.

The politician, who survived polio as a child, has been awake and talking to people and is expected to make a full recovery, said Republican senator John Barrasso, who is in his leadership team.

President Joe Biden tweeted that he wished the Senate minority leader a “speedy recovery” and looked forward to seeing him return to the Senate floor.

Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, said he had called Mr McConnell and spoken to his staff “to extend my prayers and well wishes”.

South Dakota senator John Thune told reporters he had also been at the dinner and his fellow Republican had given his remarks “as usual”.

Mr Thune, who had not seen Mr McConnell fall, added: “Evidently it happened later in the evening.”

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First elected to the Senate in 1984, Mr McConnell served as Senate majority leader from 2015 to early 2021 and as Senate minority leader since 2021.

In January this year, he became the longest-serving Senate party leader in US history, after being elected to lead the Republican conference nine times since 2006.

Democrats, including three independents who vote with them, currently hold a 51-49 majority in the upper house.

In 2019, Mr McConnell tripped and fell at his Kentucky home, suffering a shoulder fracture, and then had surgery.

Currently serving his seventh six-year term, which runs to 2026, he is the third US senator to be treated in hospital in recent weeks.

Democrat John Fetterman is being treated for depression, while Diane Feinstein, also a Democrat, was taken to hospital last week and later discharged to recuperate at home following a bout of shingles.

The Democrat absences have been a challenge for Mr Schumer with his party having a slim majority, while the Republicans, as the minority party, have had an easier time with intermittent absences.

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