Rep. Virginia Foxx, 81, slips and falls on first day of new Congress

North Carolina Rep. Virginia Foxx fell while walking down the marble steps outside the House chamber, her communications team says Newsweek.

The context

Foxx “seems to be OK,” her communications director, Alex Ives, told me Newsweek. The Republican representative went over to speak with his family in the gallery on the House floor when the incident occurred.

Foxx, 81, is the latest elderly lawmaker to injure herself while on the job. Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, 84, was hospitalized after suffering a hip injury in Luxembourg. She had surgery and was seen without her signature stilettos when the House of Representatives reconvened on Friday.

Just a few days before Pelosi’s accident, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, 82, fell and sprained his wrist after a Senate Republican luncheon on Capitol Hill.

What to know

Ives told Newsweek that doctors cared for Foxx.

“Rep. Foxx slipped while walking down the marble steps outside the House chamber after going up to speak with her family in the gallery. After being helped to her feet and attended to by medical personnel, she continued on her own to the attending physician’s office to be treated for a few individual incisions,” Ives said. “Everything seems to be fine.”

Foxx, along with the other members of the House of Representatives, was on the Hill on Friday for the first day of the 119th Congress. The House re-elected Speaker Mike Johnson for a second term. Foxx was one of the members chosen to tally the votes.

About Virginia Foxx

Foxx has represented North Carolina’s Fifth Congressional District since 2005. She served as Secretary of the House Republican Conference from 2013 to 2017. She served as Chair of the House Committee on Education and Labor from 2017 to 2019 and again since 2023.

During her tenure, Foxx was one of 11 members of Congress who voted against the $51 billion relief package for victims of Hurricane Katrina. She also introduced the Preserving Employee Wellness Programs Act in 2017.

She later voted against both articles of impeachment in 2019 for former President Donald Trump, where she was also one of the 147 Republican lawmakers who objected to the certification of electoral votes from the 2020 presidential election on January 6, 2021.

Foxx is an opponent of the Affordable Care Act, saying that “we have more to fear from the potential of the Affordable Health Care for America Act being passed than we do from any terrorist right now in any country.” In 2022, Foxx voted against the Respect for Marriage Act to codify same-sex and interracial marriage rights federally.

What people say

ABC reporter John Parkinson, on X: “A bleeding Rep. Virginia Foxx is currently receiving medical attention — holding her nose as she receives help — appearing to have fallen down the marble steps on the west side of the House. Lots of blood, but the officer tells me she’s okay as the press is cleared from the area. She is conscious/speaking.”

Journalist Ken Klippenstein, on X: “Breaking: 81-year-old Congresswoman Virginia Foxx reportedly fell down House stairs, resulting in ‘lots of blood’.”

What’s next

Foxx is at the attending physician to be treated for a few wounds.