The former Republican Senate leader has been away from the Senate for six weeks and has not said when he will return.
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Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) has not been medically cleared to leave a rehabilitation facility, the Capitol physician’s office said Monday, and will miss Kentucky’s Fancy Farm Picnic on Saturday as he continues recovering from a June fall.
McConnell, 84, was hospitalized June 14 after suffering a fall at home and has not returned to the Senate. He said earlier this month that he had moved to a rehabilitation facility but has not provided a timetable for his return.
“I’m still working hard to get back to my full schedule of work in the Senate and in Kentucky, keeping up with intense physical therapy per my doctors’ orders,” McConnell said Monday in a statement. “Unfortunately, that means I won’t be able to make it to Fancy Farm, Kentucky this Saturday.”
In an accompanying statement, Congress’s Office of the Attending Physician said McConnell was “not yet medically cleared to leave the rehab facility and return to the office.” Its physicians visit him daily, the office said, and he is undergoing multiple physical therapy sessions each day to rebuild his strength and reduce the risk of future falls. The office said childhood polio “continues to be a significant factor in his mobility.”
McConnell has been a regular speaker in the past at Fancy Farm, a picnic in rural western Kentucky that draws politicians from across the state every August.
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McConnell shared a photo of him with his wife, Elaine Chao, which his office said was taken on Sunday.
McConnell has faced growing questions about his health and when he will return to the office over the past six weeks, which occasional updates from his office have not silenced. Scott Jennings, a former McConnell campaign aide, urged McConnell last week to “routinely update his constituents on how he’s doing.”
“When you’ve been in a hospital for a month and you’ve missed all the votes … you owe your boss, like anybody else out there who works, an explanation of what’s been going on and when you’ll get back,” Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, said earlier this month.
McConnell’s office has said that he continues to work as he recovers. David Popp, a McConnell spokesman, said Friday that McConnell “continues to meet with staff regarding Senate and Kentucky business, including discussions on defense appropriations, foreign policy, the farm bill, constituent services and constituent federal grant requests.”
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