Fox News host chokes up while discussing Texas school shooting

“Fox & Friends” host Ainsley Earhardt fought back tears as she described a feeling of bewilderment following a mass shooting at an elementary school in Texas this week that left at least 19 children dead.

“I’m just sitting here thinking — you hear the phrase in church … that we all put Jesus on the cross. It wasn’t just one group. We were all guilty in that because he had to die on the cross for our sins,” Earhardt, a devout Christian who often speaks openly about her faith, said on the network’s morning show on Wednesday.

“Is this all of our faults?” she asked. “I mean, as a country, we’re so divided. We are — you hate someone else because they vote a different way than you do? You know, what makes these individuals do this to pick up a gun and go in and kill our children? Why do we now have to worry about that?”

Earhardt’s voice broke, and she paused to gather her composure as she continued.

“And you think about what these parents are going through and they’ll never see their kids again, you know, and even if they have three kids, it doesn’t replace the one that they lost,” she said, her voice quivering.

“But what about the mom who has one child, and she will never be a grandmother because this man went into these schools and did this. What do we need to do to heal as a country and make sure these gunmen like this … are stopped before they get to this point?”

On Tuesday, an 18-year-old attacker shot and killed at least 19 school children and two adults during a shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Authorities say the suspect, who was killed by police during a shootout, also allegedly shot his grandmother before beginning his rampage at the school.

The incident has sparked growing calls for stricter gun control measures from Democrats, activists and families of school shooting victims. Republican politicians and conservative pundits have largely responded by saying the incident should be viewed as proof of a need for more school safety measures.

Earhardt said that parents should help children who are struggling.

“Parents, take your children to church. I don’t know what’s going on in these individuals’ hearts, but they have a void. They have a hole in their heart and they are evil and they are unhappy. Help them to get help. And I know it’s not always the parents’ fault, because the parents are trying in many cases and when there’s mental illness involved, sometimes you’re at your wit’s end and there’s not much more you can do,” she said.

“But I don’t know what the solution is. I don’t know how to fix this. But I do know love your neighbor as yourself. That’s what the Bible instructs us to do. It doesn’t say love your neighbor if he or she is a Democrat or a Republican. And our country has gotten so divided and I just am tired of all of this evil and I don’t know what the solution is, but we definitely need to love each other and come back to where we were after 9/11, when we were one country.”