Congressman-elect Dan Crenshaw hopes that his appearance on "Saturday Night Live" in the wake of controversial comments about him by cast member Pete Davidson sent a message of healing through humor.
"It felt good,'' Crenshaw said on TODAY Monday. "It felt like the right thing to do. I would appreciate it if everybody would stop looking for reasons to be offended, and that's what this was all about."
During Saturday night's episode, Davidson apologized to Crenshaw with the Republican congressman-elect and former Navy SEAL from Texas sitting next to him on the eve of Veterans Day.
"In what I'm sure was a huge shock to people who know me, I made a poor choice last week. No I did," Davidson said after laughs. "On behalf of the show and myself, I apologize.
"I mean this from the bottom of my heart. It was a poor choice of words. The man is a war hero and he deserves all the respect in the world."
A week earlier on "SNL," Davidson had insulted Crenshaw's appearance.
"You may be surprised to hear he’s a congressional candidate from Texas and not a hit man in a porno movie ... I’m sorry, I know he lost his eye in war or whatever,'' he said on the show.
Crenshaw wears an eyepatch due to an injury he suffered from an IED explosion while serving his third tour as a Navy SEAL in Afghanistan. His other eye was also damaged in the explosion.
Kenan Thompson, Davidson's "SNL" castmate, said on TODAY last week that the joke "definitely missed the mark" but didn't think Davidson was intentionally trying to offend people.
Crenshaw got the last laugh, joking that Davidson looked "like if the meth from 'Breaking Bad' was a person."
The song "Breathin" by Ariana Grande then rang on Crenshaw's cell phone. Grande and Davidson were engaged until a public break-up last month.
The congressman-elect admitted that he was hesitant at first to come on Saturday's show, but ultimately agreed so that he could also deliver an important message. He ended his segment on "SNL" by asking people to "never forget" our military service members ahead of Veterans Day.
"We decided to do it because what better platform than to sort of give a united message for the country, talk about forgiveness, and then talk about veterans,'' he said.
"They let me do that last part, where we got a little bit serious, and I was able to give a message about what I think it means to connect with veterans and how to bridge that gap between civilians and military."