Alex Thomas
On Wednesday morning, as Washington, D.C., was waking up, shots rang out in Alexandria, Va., a suburb of the capitol. The target of the shooting was House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, of Louisiana, who was at a congressional baseball practice with members of his staff.
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Harrowing account from Rand Paul to @Morning_Joe: "There was a rapid succession of shots…I see Representative Scalise is shot but moving." pic.twitter.com/LLCWXDMc1i
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 14, 2017
Senator Rand Paul, who was also present at the practice, recounted the events to “Morning Joe.” Paul said he was in the batting cage, and noted, “I grew up in the South, and I just thought someone had discharged a shotgun, which isn’t that unusual in the South, but then I thought, ‘We are in the city; we’re not in the country here.'” He said that he saw Scalise “shot but moving, trying to drag himself out of the dirt into the outfield.”
RELATED: House Republican Steve Scalise and aides shot at Congressional baseball practice
Paul said that he “wasn’t sure where the shots were coming from.” He said that he heard “50 to 60 shots” before the Capitol Hill police responded.
“The gun continued to fire” .@RepMoBrooks gives first person account of shooting at baseball field in Alexandria https://t.co/2t5zZokBFs
— CNN (@CNN) June 14, 2017
Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama was also at the practice and told CNN that he was “on deck, about to hit batting practice,” when the shots rang out. He said, “I look around, and I see a rifle and I see a little bit of a body. Then I hear another ‘blam,’ and I realize there’s an active shooter.” He ran to the dugout, where a number of people were laying on the ground. The congressman then used his belt as a tourniquet to stop the bleeding from a staffer’s leg. Brooks heard another shot and looked up to see one of the members of their security detail firing back at the shooter with a pistol.
This story is developing.
