Ron Paul
Samuel Corum | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images
Ron Paul, the 12-term former congressman, three-time presidential candidate and staunch libertarian advocate, was hospitalized Friday after suffering a medical incident during a live taping of his talk show.
A video clip of the livestream of “Ron Paul Liberty Report” shows Paul, 85, discussing the economy and then suddenly slurring his speech and speaking unintelligibly. The video, which was widely circulated on Twitter, cuts to another speaker on the call, who asks, “Dr. Paul?” without receiving a response.
Later Friday afternoon, Paul’s official Twitter account tweeted a photo of Paul in a hospital bed.
“I am doing fine. Thank you for your concern,” Paul said, according to the tweet.
“Thank God, Dad is doing well. Thank you for all your prayers today,” tweeted Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., one of Ron Paul’s five children.
An operator at a hospital in Lake Jackson, Texas, told CNBC that a person named Ron Paul was being treated in the emergency room. When transferred to the ER, CNBC was told that no information on any patients could be provided because of federal disclosure laws.
The Ron Paul Institute did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Paul was a flight surgeon in the Air Force and an obstetrician before entering politics as a Republican in the mid-1970s.
As a Texas congressman, he quickly carved out a reputation as a strict adherent of limited-government principles and a narrow interpretation of the powers of the Constitution. During his first term in 1976, Paul founded the nonprofit think tank the Foundation for Rational Economics and Education, or FREE.
Paul ran in the 1988 presidential election on the Libertarian Party ticket. He ran as a Republican in the 2008 and 2012 elections.
Paul has been a longtime critic of the Federal Reserve’s monetary policies and has advocated a return to the gold standard.
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