A week after Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) was able to ask for toast for breakfast, the Congresswoman can now mouth song lyrics and walk with the help of a shopping cart.
Giffords’s husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, told NBC in an exclusive interview broadcast Monday that his wife can now respond to his questions and her ability to talk is “coming back very quickly.”
Giffords is in a “great mood—she is always a very upbeat and positive person,” Kelly told NBC’s Brian Williams. The interview will air in its entirety Monday night.
Kelly said that Giffords mouthed the lyrics of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” and “Happy Birthday to You,” and talked briefly via telephone with her astronaut brother-in-law, Scott Kelly, while he was orbiting in the International Space Station.
“She said, ‘Hi, I’m good,’” Pia Carusone, Giffords’s chief of staff, told the New York Times in a telephone interview.
The 40-year-old Congresswoman was moved from University Medical Center in Tucson to TIRR Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston in late January for more intensive rehabilitation.
She was shot in the head on Jan. 8 outside a Safeway grocery store in a suburb of Tucson, Ariz. The suspect, 22-year-old Jared Lee Loughner, allegedly killed six and injured 14 during an assassination attempt on Giffords.
Arizona authorities said that Loughner will not face state justice until federal proceedings are completed, according to the Daily Mail.
Loughner has pleaded not guilty to two federal charges of attempted murder and one of attempted assassination on Jan. 24. If convicted, he could face death penalty.
Giffords’s husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, told NBC in an exclusive interview broadcast Monday that his wife can now respond to his questions and her ability to talk is “coming back very quickly.”
Giffords is in a “great mood—she is always a very upbeat and positive person,” Kelly told NBC’s Brian Williams. The interview will air in its entirety Monday night.
Kelly said that Giffords mouthed the lyrics of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” and “Happy Birthday to You,” and talked briefly via telephone with her astronaut brother-in-law, Scott Kelly, while he was orbiting in the International Space Station.
“She said, ‘Hi, I’m good,’” Pia Carusone, Giffords’s chief of staff, told the New York Times in a telephone interview.
The 40-year-old Congresswoman was moved from University Medical Center in Tucson to TIRR Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston in late January for more intensive rehabilitation.
She was shot in the head on Jan. 8 outside a Safeway grocery store in a suburb of Tucson, Ariz. The suspect, 22-year-old Jared Lee Loughner, allegedly killed six and injured 14 during an assassination attempt on Giffords.
Arizona authorities said that Loughner will not face state justice until federal proceedings are completed, according to the Daily Mail.
Loughner has pleaded not guilty to two federal charges of attempted murder and one of attempted assassination on Jan. 24. If convicted, he could face death penalty.
