Rep. Mark Walker, R-N.C., said that the Wednesday shooting at a congressional baseball practice that injured four was "unsettling."
Walker said he had just left the practice before the shooting took place.
"It's a little unsettling. As a pastor for nearly two decades before coming to Congress, you counsel with people, you work with people, but you never think this is going to be something you are literally seeing play out," he said Thursday on "Fox & Friends."
"I'm very proud of my colleagues … one Army surgeon, who really helped Steve [Scalise] with the tourniquet, stopped the bleeding. But it's really unnerving to know of the rhetoric that has driven it to this place, and sad in some ways."
He said lawmakers could maintain their opinions, while having the discipline to work together.
"There's a way to do both. There's a way to talk about our differences, there's a way to stand for our values, but do so in a way that honors our faith, but [with] a certain statesmanship quality that I believe has been dissipating over the last few years."
The congressman, the pitcher at the congressional baseball game Thursday night, said the game would be "a time of healing."
Walker spoke on Thursday to Virginia TV station Fox 8, and mentioned the need for lawmakers to respect each other. "I think what we have to make sure, as members of Congress, is that people see that we love and care about each other," he said.
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