(CNN) -- Republican Rep. Steve King said Wednesday he partly blames former president Barack Obama for the divided political climate that he argues led to the shooting of House Majority Whip and three others on a baseball field in Alexandria, Virginia.
"I do want to put some of this at the feet of Barack Obama," the Iowa congressman said in an interview with Simon Conway on WHO Iowa radio. "He contributed mightily to dividing us. He focused on our differences rather than our things that unify us. And this is some of the fruits of that labor."
The host had asked King whose responsibility it was to "shut down the crazy" elements of American politics and how to do so.
"Our whole society and culture has to come together on this," King replied. "And those are just not platitudes on my part. I'm saying we've got leaders out there that can help pull us together but in the end it traces back to our families, to our fathers, to our mothers, to good examples, to the right things being said around the kitchen table, in the living room, in church and in school. And if the culture is gonna be divided, it's been divided core back to there."
"And if it's gonna be united, it's gotta be united all the way back to the principle subsidiarity, which I speak to occasionally, as close to the individual and as close to the people that's close to the individual, which means family first, is where it needs to be," King continued, before arguing that Obama deserves some blame for the present environment.
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