US senator caught driving while in Zoom meeting on distracted driving bill

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A senator from Ohio in the United States was caught driving during a Zoom meeting with other lawmakers as they discussed the distracted driving bill.

House Bill 283, which was being introduced, seeks to ban writing, sending or reading texts, viewing videos or taking photos, live streaming and using applications while driving, as per The Colombus Dispatch on May 3.

State Sen. Andrew Brenner has since been drawing flak after clips from the meeting surfaced online, showing him driving using a Zoom background of the interior of an office.

Brody Logan of NBC affiliate KSEE was among the Twitter users who shared the videos, which have since gone viral in the past few days.

“This Ohio State Senator thought he was slick, using a Zoom background of his home office while driving… debating a bill for harsher penalties for distracted driving,” he posted on May 6.

The clips showed Brenner wearing a seatbelt as he drove. At some points, the Zoom background appeared to be glitching, revealing the inside of his car.

“I wasn’t distracted. I was paying attention to the driving and listening to it (the meeting),” Brenner was, meanwhile, quoted as saying.

“I had two meetings that were back to back that were in separate locations. And I’ve actually been on other calls, numerous calls, while driving. Phone calls for the most part but on video calls, I’m not paying attention to the video. To me, it’s like a phone call,” he added.

The senator also claimed that he was parked during most of the virtual meeting, according to the report.