In the seven weeks that former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been absent from the upper chamber, his staff has continued to earn tens of thousands of dollars.
The Kentucky senator’s six highest-paid staffers earned a combined $173,200 pre-tax in the past 50 days that he has been missing from Capitol Hill, a Daily Beast analysis can reveal.
When accounting for the rest of McConnell’s office, which has about 40 staffers including low-level employees, the Daily Beast calculated that his entire staff received around $485,800 pre-tax in the last 50 days that their boss has been missing.
McConnell’s Senate office is led by his camera-shy chief of staff Terry Carmack, who receives an annual salary of $226,000. The senator’s communications director, Stephanie Penn, earns about $214,000 per year, even as she has presided over this PR fiasco.
Other top earners on his staff include his operations director, Melissa Bennet, who earns $226,000 per year, and his state director, Robbin Taylor, who also earns $226,000 per year.
McConnell was taken to the hospital on June 14, which his staff did not address until July 2.
After much speculation about his condition, an update from McConnell asserted that he did not suffer “a heart attack or a stroke,” even as a 911 call to his residence mentioned cardiac arrest at the time he was taken to the hospital.
McConnell asserted he was taken to the hospital after a fall and was “briefly unconscious,” adding that he subsequently “had to deal with a mild case of pneumonia” while recovering. In that update, he attached a picture of himself holding the day’s newspaper alongside his wife, Elaine Chao, a former official in the Bush administration and the first Trump administration.
His staff has repeatedly declined to provide further information on the state of McConnell’s health, only giving vague updates insisting that he is still working on Senate matters and that he “appreciates the outpouring of support” while continuing treatment.
The Daily Beast has again reached out to McConnell’s Senate office for comment, but did not receive a response.
On Monday, Penn, the communications director, was seen on Capitol Hill as she was pressed on McConnell’s prolonged absence. She grinned and smirked while remaining silent as independent journalist Desiree Townsend hammered her with questions.
“Do you think it is fair that your office and the other staffers are still getting paid while Kentuckians go without representation?” Townsend asked Penn, who just gave a broad smile and continued walking.
Senate leadership, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso, as well as CNN’s in-house MAGA advocate Scott Jennings, have all claimed that they have been in contact with McConnell via 20-minute phone calls.
But some Senate Republicans have grown frustrated that they do not know more about his condition, especially given the party’s razor-thin majority in the upper chamber ahead of high-stakes votes to advance President Donald Trump’s agenda ahead of the scheduled August recess.
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, has also pushed for more answers about the senator’s mysterious health issues.
Even Trump appears unconvinced that McConnell is doing as well as his staff claims.
“Well, I don’t hear much. I was, uh, never a huge fan,” the president admitted earlier this month, adding, “I hope he’s going to be fine. I—I don’t know if he’s fine, but I certainly hope he’s going to be fine.”
