- Rep. John Rhodes of Tennessee delivered an impassioned defense of Donald Trump on Monday.
- But all eyes were on her six-year-old son Guy, whose behind-the-scenes antics stole the show.
- Guy had just graduated from kindergarten, and Rose said Guy had asked her to smile for his little brother.
Politics can be exhausting: The 2024 election is set to be a battle between the two oldest candidates in U.S. history, featuring hints of war, a rash of federal crimes and an increasingly divided electorate.
Six-year-old Guy Rose is showing us all how he copes.
As his father, Republican Rep. John Rhodes of Tennessee, took to the podium on Monday to blast former President Donald Trump's New York prosecutors, his son, sitting behind him, gave the cameras a range of looks.
At first he flashed the camera with a charming smile, then seemed to lose interest, and then seemed to get a funny idea.
“Regardless of one's opinion of the current Republican candidate, it is useful to remember this country's long and cherished tradition of resolving political differences at the ballot box,” Rose said.
Meanwhile, Guy began making goofy faces, wagging his tongue, rolling his eyes and making exaggerated hand gestures, among other things.
His father went on to say that May 30, when Trump was found guilty of 34 felony counts, will be remembered as “one of the most infamous days in American history” because of the “baseless” charges against him.
Behind Rose, Guy seemed bored, taking a toy out of his pocket and playing with it, occasionally sending cheeky glances into the camera.
C-SPAN captured just five minutes of the boy's adorable antics while his father spoke, but the footage quickly went viral.
According to Rose, these expressions were inspired by Guy encouraging his younger brother Sam to smile for the camera.
The Associated Press reported that Guy graduated from kindergarten last week and that his brother and mother, Chelsea, have returned to their home in Tennessee.
Rose's opponents criticized the congressman on Monday night. Write on X “We'll laugh at him while he talks.”
Doug Andres, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, suggested that Guy might have been trying to tell everyone something about the Illuminati.
Rose, now 59, was likely around 53 when his wife gave birth to son Guy. In 2011, he was 45 when he married Chelsea Rose, who was 21 and a college senior at the time, according to the liberal political magazine American Prospect.
Rose founded Transcender, an IT training company, and served as president of Nashville-based Boson Software, Inc. Rose also served as Tennessee's agriculture commissioner from 2001 to 2003 and became a representative for the state's 6th Congressional District in 2019.
Rhodes generally votes and aligns with his party in politics, and has recently defended Trump and supported Israel.