(FILES) US Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican from Kentucky, speaks during a Senate Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Defense hearing to examine the 2027 budget for the Department of Defense on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on May 12, 2026. Republican US Senator Mitch McConnell, the upper chamber's former leader, returned to Congress on September 14, 2026 after a monthslong medical absence due to a bad fall. The 84-year-old senator from Kentucky was first hospitalized in mid-June, putting pressure on the slim majority his fellow Republicans held in the Senate. (Photo by Jim WATSON / AFP via Getty Images)