BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) – The tipping point for Chris Hurst came last fall while reporting on a shooting at a rail car factory. When the camera turned off, he wept.
Just more than a year earlier, the 29-year-old’s reporter girlfriend was gunned down while conducting an interview on live TV. Now, Hurst was using the same truck that Alison Parker had used the last day of her life to report live from the scene of another shooting.
Hurst realized he needed a drastic life change.
The former TV anchor is now running for political office, challenging a National Rifle Association-backed candidate for a competitive Virginia state House seat in a firearm friendly part of the state. Hurst sees it as a way to honor the memory of the woman he thought he’d marry and to give back to the community that helped him through his darkest days.
“When we understand that life is fragile, does that mean we give up and say life ain’t worth it? No,” Hurst said at a local Democratic committee meeting in March. “That’s when we say it is worth it, and we do what we can when we’re here to try to help another person.”