WATCH: Beloved GOP Senator Appears To ‘Freeze’ During Interview On Fox

An elderly Republican U.S. senator appeared to freeze during a live TV interview, sparking a new round of concern about seniority in Congress.

Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), who turned 73 in November, froze up while defending President Donald Trump’s approach to cracking down on sanctuary cities amidst blue-state pushback on his immigration policies. The MAGA supporter was talking about Democratic opponents who promised to spend the August recess barnstorming town halls and putting Republicans under pressure over strong-arm tactics used by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“Jesus loves him, but–” Kennedy started before abruptly pausing. He tried one more time before trailing off.

“Everybody else,” stuttered the senator. Host Larry Kudlow returned to the screen, and Kennedy’s camera cut away.

Kudlow blamed Kennedy’s lapse on “technical problems,” but viewers began to speculate whether something more serious had occurred.

“They had an audio glitch, but let’s try to make it into a health thing. Good grief,” one defender of Kennedy claimed.

Others were less forgiving.

“He was the glitch,” one X user quipped.

A third noted that Kennedy appeared to be swaying side to side, and he licked his lips before the camera cut away, showing the signal was still coming through.

“His mouth was not moving and it was not a freeze frame. It wasn’t a situation where he was talking and the microphone wasn’t working. He literally lost his ability to communicate temporarily,” they observed.

Another compared it to Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), the former majority leader who garnered national headlines for several inexplicable pauses during public speeches and a nasty spill in 2023 that sent him to the hospital.

“He and McConnell must need better sound crews,” he said.

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Kennedy entered the Senate after winning his first election in 2016; before that, he served 17 years as Louisiana’s state treasurer. His deep-red southern state offers little in the way of competition, especially given the Republican’s penchant for conservative positions that all but eliminate the chance of a primary challenger.

Although he shares the same name as former President John F. Kennedy, Sen. Kennedy and his family are unrelated. Their history in Louisiana dates back more than a century to his grandfather Leonidas Calhoun, who owned hundreds of acres across Catahoula and Concordia Parishes.  Some of those lands were inherited by Kennedy after his mother passed.

He worked briefly as a New Orleans-area attorney before transitioning into elected life. He first served as special counsel to former Governor Buddy Roemer.

His first bid for public office was successful in 1999, when Kennedy unseated Ken Duncan, the state’s Democratic treasurer.