‘We’re trying to pretend we’re going back to normal’

As he took the field at Nationals Park Thursday for his third consecutive Congressional Baseball Game appearance, U.S. Rep. Ryan Costello could have been excused for not having his mind entirely on the more sporting aspects of the contest, like keeping his consecutive game hitting streak alive or trying to increase his on-base percentage.

Instead, he – and the other members of the Republican and Democratic teams that gathered again for the annual charity game – more likely than not had his mind on the circumstances that left him without the steady second baseman he’d been working out with as the GOP’s double-play combination.

U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, of Louisiana, was still listed in critical condition in a Washington, D.C., hospital after being shot in the hip Wednesday by a man armed with a rifle who fired dozens of shots at the GOP legislators as they held a final practice for the baseball game. Five others also were wounded; two remain hospitalized.

“I’m still looking forward to the game, but with mixed feelings especially since Steve is in critical condition,” said Costello, R-6 of West Goshen, Thursday morning. “We play next to each other and we are close baseball buddies. We do practice infield and always do doubleplay combos on the practice field because we are the starting infield up the middle.

“It’s weird and given my personal circumstances and where I should’ve been that morning, I’m having all sorts of thoughts, some of which are difficult to even admit because it tears me up,” he said.

Costello has been asked countless time by media across the nation to repeat the story of how he came to miss standing on the baseball diamond in Alexandria, Va., when the gunman started firing shots at those on the practice field. He’d scheduled to catch a ride with other GOP members from the Capitol to the field, but missed his ride by two minutes.

Otherwise, “I would have been right there in the line of fire,” Costello told Time Magazine in an interview. In at shortstop, he would have been next to Scalise in between second and third base, where the shots came from. “It would have been hard to miss me,” he said.

None of that kept Costello from playing last night. With his family watching from the stands, Costello led off and played shortstop as he had practiced.

Unfortunately for Republicans, the Democrats raced out to a big lead, largely on the strength of the hitting and pitching of Rep. Cedric Richmond, a Democrat from Louisiana, and a close friend of Scalise. A crowd of nearly 25,000 came out to cheer on both sides in the charity tilt.

In an interview, Costello said that the routines of life on Capitol Hill had largely returned to normal after Wednesday’s events, which had left him in a “state of shock.” But the thought of the shooting continued to haunt him, he allowed.

“Things are getting back to normal in the sense we now know what happened and who did what,” he said. “What is still unsettled is the condition of Steve Scalise, given his wounds” and the others still under care. “It is unsettling because yesterday we heard that Steve was recovering. But things are now a little more critical. But today is a normal day in the sense that the House is open.

“What we’re trying to do is pretend that we’re going back to normal,” said the second-term congressman who represents portions of Chester, Montgomery, Berks and Lebanon counties. “But there won’t really be a sense of normalcy until next week, especially for those who are playing” in the Congressional Baseball Game.

He said he had seen others Thursday morning in the House who he’d encountered just as the shooting was unfolding the morning prior, and that some tears were shed. “People in those circumstances are not going to be fine right away,” he said. “How can you be?”

He carries a nagging feeling that he saw the alleged gunman in the same park the morning before, sitting on bleachers behind home plate. Costello said he had purposefully not watched any of the videos that surfaced that showed the shooting, but that while falling asleep had hear the audio from a television broadcast. It chilled him to think about the “what ifs.”