Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear has a message for Sen. Mitch McConnell: Either the state’s senior senator should explain his long absence from the Senate and give details about his health, or resign.
Beshear sent a new, blunt letter on Monday to McConnell, the former Senate majority leader who hasn’t been seen in public for 43 days since being hospitalized, suggesting that the governor’s doubts that the photos — another of which was released earlier Monday — show an honest portrayal of the senator’s health.
“I am addressing this letter to Senator McConnell under the assumption that he is capable of reading and responding verbally, and not incapacitated by means of consciousness or cognition. If the Senator is unable to respond for either of those or other conditions, consider this letter a demand for his Senate staff to be honest and transparent with the people of Kentucky,” Beshear writes in the letter, written on state government letterhead and obtained by CNN.
McConnell’s office released a statement earlier on Monday in which McConnell says he wants to get back out in Kentucky but is not yet medically cleared to leave a rehab facility. His statement included an update from the Office of the Attending Physician, which serves the medical needs of members of Congress.
