
By Aaron Earls
For the first time since a shooting left six people hospitalized last year, congressional Republicans returned to Simpson Field together Wednesday for baseball practice for their annual charity game.
Several representatives spoke with CBN about that tragic day and about the “miracles that saved their lives.”
Rep. Steve Scalise was critically injured in June 2017 when a gunman opened fire on Republicans gathered for baseball practice.
A single gunshot wound to his left hip did significant damage to his blood vessels, bones and some internal organs, according to CNN.
Despite the injuries he suffered, Scalise said he saw the miraculous that day.
“You can’t explain some of the things that happened on that ball field except that God performed real miracles,” he told CBN News.
Scalise said he initially thought the noise he heard was the backfire of a tractor, but Rep. Trent Kelly, who served in Iraq with the Army National Guard, said he knew immediately it was gunfire.
Kelly told CBN he was staring straight down the barrel of a rifle only 15 feet away. “I looked him dead in his face and he had the most evil, sinister look,” Kelly said.
The shooter fired three shots directly at Kelly, but none hit him. One bullet struck the chain-link fence and ricocheted past him.
This chain link fence was bent and broken by a bullet nearly one year ago — today, Congressional Republicans were back in the dugout, their first time back together on Simpson Field in Alexandria pic.twitter.com/170KYxnSbl
— Betsy Klein (@betsy_klein) April 25, 2018
“The calmness and the way that I acted and the things that I did were directly attributable to, He guides us as long as we’re following His steps,” Kelly told CBN.
Kelly saw Scalise get shot and go down. As he lay on the ground, Scalise said he prayed.
“I prayed and asked Him for very specific things, and you know, at that point, it was almost like this calm came over me because I just really felt like God was going to take care of me, and boy, did He ever,” he said.
Scalise credits God with a series of events that he says saved his life.
I had no idea how things would end that fateful day, but I prayed and had faith that God would take care of me. And He did, through the life-saving actions of the US Capitol Police and @RepBradWenstrup. Without them on that field, that day could have ended much differently. pic.twitter.com/274YmOaIJA
— Steve Scalise (@SteveScalise) April 24, 2018
Rep. Brad Wenstrup, a former combat surgeon, rushed to him and applied a tourniquet. The EMT drivers taking him to the hospital were stuck in rush-hour traffic and turned around when they saw a helicopter they hoped would be landing on the baseball field. It did.
Scalise arrived at the hospital without any blood pressure. After he survived that, an infection threatened to take his life.
“They weren’t sure whether I was going to make it those first few days,” Scalise told CBN, “but finally I did and thank God for the miracles and for the prayers from all around the country.”
Scalise returned to Congress to a standing ovation only months after being shot.
Welcome back @SteveScalise!#TeamScalise pic.twitter.com/CoRed8rfL2
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 28, 2017
“I am definitely a living example that miracles really do happen,” he told his fellow members of Congress.
AARON EARLS (@WardrobeDoor) is online editor of Facts & Trends.