Concerns over age limits for politicians reignited after Mitch McConnell's second freeze-up

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell froze up again last week during a speech.

It’s the second time the 81-year-old politician froze up like that. On Aug. 30, McConnell appeared to freeze up and remained silent for about 30 seconds during a news conference. In July, a similar incident happened to McConnell in Washington.

The U.S. Capitol physician said Tuesday these incidents show no sign of being strokes or seizures, you don’t need to be the official Capitol doctor to find these moments concerning. It’s no surprise they’ve reignited the discussion around age limits for politicians.

The 118th Congress is the third-oldest since 1789. The oldest Congress ever was the 117th. It shows our elected leaders are almost older than they’ve ever been. Some leaders are very old.

The youngest member of Congress is Maxwell Frost, a Democratic representative from Central Florida. He was elected at 25 and recently turned 26. He wasn’t born when Diane Feinstein, D-California, was elected in 1992. Feinstein turned 90 this year. When Feinstein was 25, Alaska and Hawaii weren’t even states yet, most cars were made without seatbelts and the average cost of a new home was $12,000.

There are age limits to serve in the federal government:

• You must be at least 30 years old to be a U.S. senator
• You must be at least 25 years told to be a U.S. representative
• You must be at least 35 years told to become president

However, there are no rules for maximum age or term limits for Congress. It’s solidified by a 1995 case heard by the U.S. Supreme Court. The court found that the founders could have created Congressional term limits but chose not to.

"Whether you're talking about adding term limits or whether you're talking about a maximum age, you're still changing the qualifications that are set out in the Constitution,” Northeastern University School of Law professor Jeremy Paul told NPR.

Perhaps the founding fathers didn’t foresee a future where people lived so long. The life expectancy was 36 years old in 1787 during the Constitutional Convention. Right now, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show the life expectancy in the U.S. is 79.

The last U.S. Census in 2020 showed the country has 5.7 million Americans older than 85. It’s more than the entire country’s population in 1787.

People still got old in the 1700s: Thomas Jefferson died at 83 and John Adams at 90.

Perhaps the idea of an 80-year-old president to the country’s founders was as farfetched as having machines in their brains.

Last month, the Smithsonian published “Woman With Paralysis Can Speak By Thinking With a Brain Implant and A.I.” – which is a major breakthrough in a larger goal to continue integrating tech into our bodies and minds.

Also, humans can grow organs from stem cells. Stanford University researchers are so far along – they’re running into major ethical conundrums.

“Creating a non-human primate with human brain cells is a boundary we wouldn’t cross,” Stanford research scientist Dr. Morteza Roodgar wrote.

We know more today about our bodies and minds than ever before – including how we age – because frankly, we have more old people to study now than we ever have – and the newest science is fascinating.