WASHINGTON — An American lawmaker was among several people shot in a multi-minute scene of terror that unfolded on a suburban baseball field Wednesday, leaving the gunman dead and several others with injuries.
A gunman fired dozens of rounds at a gathering of Republican lawmakers practising for their annual baseball game against Democrats, spraying bullets across the field from his vantage point along the third-base line.
A prominent politician was among several people hit: senior congressional Republican Steve Scalise, who fell to the ground near second base and crawled toward the outfield in search of safety.
The injuries to the Republicans' majority whip were not life-threatening. Witnesses said the tragic scene could have been significantly worse, if not for Capitol Hill police on the scene who exchanged fire with the gunman, ultimately killing him.
The ensuing chaos drew about 100 police officers from different departments within minutes, according to witnesses, and helicopters swooped in to airlift the injured from the baseball field in suburban Alexandria, Va., outside Washington.
The gunman's death was announced by President Donald Trump. Reports suggested his identity matched that of a man from Illinois who had posted numerous anti-Trump, anti-Republican, pro-Bernie Sanders and pro-Green party messages on his Facebook page.
The president delivered a call for unity in a politically polarized country: "We may have our differences, but we do well, in times like these, to remember that everyone who serves in our nation’s capital is here because, above all, they love our country....
"Everyone on that field is a public servant."
Plaudits rained upon police, in particular. A pair of officers protecting the lawmakers left the scene injured — but not before preventing what would have been a bloodbath, according to one politician there.
"Our lives were saved by the Capitol Hill police. Had they not been there it would've been a massacre," Sen. Rand Paul told Fox News of the scene he witnessed.
"You are completely helpless. Having no self-defence and no way to get to somebody. The field was basically a killing field if you were to run out there while the shooter was still shooting."
He told another interviewer that everyone there faced a life-and-death, split-second dilemma: Stay where they were, or scurry for safety in the outfield or the dugout and risk becoming easy targets in an open field.
Another Republican described how people fled to the dugout. They huddled in terror, not knowing whether the gunman might move in their direction and pin them down in an enclosed area.
"We didn't know if there were other shooters that had us surrounded and would come into the dugout," Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake told reporters on the scene.
"We didn't know whether to run."
Congressman Mo Brooks said he was on deck, preparing to bat, when the shooting started. He saw a rifle near third base. Then he said he suddenly saw Scalise bleeding, crawling into the outfield.
He said there were easily 50 shots fired.
He said Scalise, 51, suffered "a hip wound." The Alabama lawmaker said his colleague left a trail of blood as he crawled away: "We started giving him the liquids, I put pressure on his wound in his hip."
House Speaker Paul Ryan's office said Scalise's wounds were not believed to be life-threatening and that a member of the security detail was also shot. Scalise is the No. 3 House Republican leader. He was first elected to the House in 2008 after serving in the state legislature.
Another Republican lawmaker left a few minutes before the shooting. On the way out, he had a quick conversation he has since reported to police.
Ron DeSantis said he was walking to his car with a colleague and described to Fox News an exchange he had with a man, who was unarmed: "There was a guy that walked up to us that was asking whether it was Republicans or Democrats out there. And it was just a little odd. And then he kind of walked towards the area where all this happened."
Political rivals expressed their own horror at what unfolded.
Democrats preparing at their own baseball practice prayed for their Republican colleagues when news broke. California congressman Pete Aguilar tweeted: “My heart is heavy right now. We just said a prayer for our colleagues and are holding to leave Dem baseball practice."
The incident instantly brought to mind another American political shooting.
The victim of that shooting, Gabrielle Giffords, is no longer in Congress and has waged a years-long struggle to recover. The Arizona Democrat responded to the news on Twitter: "My heart is with my former colleagues, their families (and) staff."
She called the Capitol police public servants and heroes.
Canada's prime minister offered a word of condolence from Ottawa: "Obviously our hearts go out to everyone affected — the families, the community," Justin Trudeau said. "Obviously, everyone in Washington, D.C., is no doubt rattled by this. Our thoughts go to the congressman."
SUSPECT IN VIRGINIA SHOOTING VENTED AGAINST TRUMP ON SOCIAL MEDIA
The suspect who authorities say fired on Republican lawmakers as they played baseball on Wednesday raged against Republican US President Donald Trump on social media and idolised Bernie Sanders, who he viewed as the only politician who understood the working class.
A senior US official named the gunman as James T. Hodgkinson from the St. Louis suburb of Belleville, Illinois.
Media reports said he was a 66-year-old home inspector. He died from injuries sustained in a shoot-out with Capitol Hill police who were at the scene in Alexandria, Virginia.
He is believed by investigators to have been a person “of strong views,” the US official said, without elaborating.
The Belleville News-Democrat, the local newspaper, posted a photo of Hodgkinson protesting outside a post office there in 2012, wearing sunglasses and a goatee and holding a homemade placard that read “TAX the Rich.”
Hodgkinson was a member of many anti-Republican groups on Facebook including “The Road to Hell Is Paved With Republicans,” “Terminate The Republican Party,” and “Donald Trump is not my President,” a search of what appeared to be his profile showed.
Trump won the US presidential election in November and took office in January. Republicans also control both chambers of Congress.
“Trump is a Traitor. Trump Has Destroyed Our Democracy. It’s Time to Destroy Trump & Co.” Hodgkinson wrote in a March 22 post that linked to a Change.org petition calling for the removal of Trump from office.
His timeline was headed by a cover photograph of Sanders, a US Senator from Vermont who campaigned unsuccessfully to be the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate last year.
Hodgkinson’s profile picture was a US flag overlaid with the slogan, “Democratic Socialism explained in 3 words: ‘We the People.’ Since 1776.”
According to media reports, Hodgkinson owned a home inspection business called JTH Inspections. Its license expired in November last year and was not renewed, the reports said.
Hodgkinson was charged in April 2006 with battery and aiding damage to a motor vehicle, according to state records. The charges were dismissed, the records show.
He pleaded guilty to a 2007 speeding offense, driving 15 to 20 miles per hour over the limit, according to court records in Jefferson County, Illinois. The records identified him as a five-foot, six-inch (1.67-meter) man weighing 190 pounds (86 kg), with brown eyes.
According to his Facebook profile, Hodgkinson went to Belleville Township High School West and studied flight training at Southwestern Illinois College.
A review of his online posts stretching back several years found that his public posts were almost exclusively about politics, and that they often sharply criticized Republican politicians and policies.
Among the most frequent topics Hodgkinson wrote about were income inequality and money in politics. He referred to Citizens United v. FEC, the landmark 2010 US Supreme Court ruling that eased regulation of campaign spending, as “Citizens Divided.” Sanders said in a statement on Wednesday that the suspected gunman was somebody who had “apparently volunteered” on his presidential campaign. He condemned the shooting, saying he was “sickened by this despicable act.”
Beginning around the summer of 2015, Hodgkinson began often expressing enthusiastic support for Sanders’ 2016 campaign.
Sanders, an independent, ran an insurgent campaign during the Democratic primary as a progressive populist on a platform that promised to increase taxes on the wealthy and broaden the social safety net in the United States. He was defeated in the nominating contests by Hillary Clinton.
“Bernie is the Only Candidate in Decades that Really Cares about the Working Class,” Hodgkinson posted on June 13, 2016.
Gunman, who shot at US Congressman Steve Scalise in Virginia, dies: Donald Trump
US President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced that the gunman, who opened fire on Republican members of the US Congress during a baseball practice near Washington on Wednesday, injuring several people including senior Republican leader Steve Scalise, has died.
Earlier, police had said that the shooting suspect was in custody and "not a threat."
Talking to reporters, city Police Chief Michael Brown said, "Five people were transported medically from the scene” in Alexandria. Two of the wounded were Capitol Hill police who were at the scene, witnesses said.
