A Minnesota lawmaker was caught in an embarassing Zoom mishap after being briefly seen shirtless and lying in bed.
Senator Calvin Bahr was attending a Minnesota Office of the Legislative Auditor Zoom meeting that was also streamed on YouTube when the mishap occurred.
The Republican from East Bethel was first elected to the Minnesota legislature in 2016, where he served in the House of Representatives for three terms.
He was elected to the Minnesota Senate in 2022.
On social media, the clip shared by journalist Aaron Rupar attracted more than two million views as of Tuesday morning.
The senator was seen topless and responding to a roll call for the meeting. He could be seen quickly ducking down after saying “yes” when his name was called.
“This State Senator is a whole vibe. I can’t stop laughing,” commented a Twitter user.
“He had one of those 2 oz joints and had a hard time getting out of bed,” said another.
This is not the first time a Zoom gaffe has entertained social media users. After the onset of the Covid pandemic, several clips of employees working from home and being caught in awkward situations during Zoom meetings were shared widely.
In one such incident from 2021, a Texas lawyer had his Zoom stuck on a cat filter in a hilarious technical mishap during a court appearance.
County attorney Rod Ponton sounded unmistakably anxious as he said: “Are you there judge?” after being alerted to the fact that his face was not showing up on the call.
“I don’t know how to remove it, I got my assistant here, she’s trying to,” Mr Ponton said after the mouth and eyes of a cat moved along with his words and movements.
“We’re prepared to go forward with it,” he said, appearing to admit defeat.
“I’m here live, I’m not a cat.”
In another incident, a Minnesota Republican representative appeared upside-down in a video conference.
In a serious incident, legal expert Jeffrey Toobin, who was then employed by the New Yorker magazine, was seen masturbating during a Zoom call in October 2020.
“I made an embarrassingly stupid mistake, believing I was off-camera,” Toobin later said in a statement.
“I apologise to my wife, family, friends and co-workers. I thought I had muted the Zoom video, I thought no one on the Zoom call could see me.”
