Texas school shooting: Biden calls for ‘turning pain into action’ on gun laws after attack – latest updates

Authorities are now saying the victim toll now stands at 19 children and two adults, the Associated Press is reporting.

We will have more detail shorty.

The US Justice Department has released a statement this evening, describing the attack as an act of “unspeakable violence”. Attorney general Merrick B Garland said:

You Might Like

Today, another mass shooting has taken the lives of innocent victims, including elementary school children and their teacher. This act of unspeakable violence has devastated an entire community and shaken our country.

FBI and ATF agents have responded to the scene, and the Justice Department is committed to providing our full support to our law enforcement partners on the ground in Texas and to the Uvalde community.

We join our fellow Americans in mourning this terrible loss and in their resolve to end this senseless violence.”

Eva Mireles’ aunt, Lydia Martinez Delgado, has also spoken with KSAT-TV, the local ABC News affiliate in the San Antonio area, and issued the following statement:

My niece, Eva Mireles, approximately 17 yr teacher for UCISD along with another teacher and 18 children lost her lives to a senseless tragic shooting.

I’m furious that these shooting continue, these children are innocent, rifles should not be easily available to all. This is a my hometown a small community of less then 20,000.

I never imagined this would happen to especially to loved ones. not all the facts have been released yet all we can do is pray hard for our country, state, schools and especially the families of all.”

We are receiving reports that the teacher who was shot and killed has been identified as Eva Mireles, a teacher of 17 years who taught fourth graders at Robb Elementary.

Mireles’ aunt, Lydia Martinez Delgado, said her niece was was shot and killed by the gunman while trying to protect her students, in a telephone interview with the New York Times.

Delgado said Mireles was in her early 40s, married with one child and was an avid hiker who took pride in teaching, her aunt added.

“She was the fun of the party,” she added.

KSAT-TV, the local ABC News affiliate in the San Antonio area, is also identifying Mireles as the victim in the attack.

The network reports that she worked at Robb Elementary as a fourth grade teacher, instructing pupils between 9-10 years old.

Hello readers, Guardian reporter Kari Paul here logging off after what has been a very heavy day. Details are still emerging in the mass shooting that occurred in Uvalde, Texas this morning. My colleagues in Australia will be with you soon. Here is what we know so far:

• An 18-year-old man in Texas opened fire in an elementary school, killing at least 18 students and three teachers.
• Earlier in the day, Texas governor Greg Abbott had told reporters at least 14 children and one adult had been killed in the school shooting in the south-west of the state. The death toll was later updated by Roland Gutierrez, a Texas state senator who was briefed by police.

• Few victims have been publicly identified, but one adult has been confirmed as fourth-grade teacher Eva Mireles. “I’m furious that these shootings continue,” her aunt said in a statement. “These children are innocent. Rifles should not be easily available to all.”
• Gutierrez offered more harrowing details from the attack: the suspect, 18-year-old Salvador Romas, shot his grandmother at her home in the morning and fled the scene by car before wrecking his vehicle outside the elementary school. He ran into the school and began shooting, Gutierrez said.

• The shooting took place at Robb elementary school in Uvalde, a heavily Latino community about 85 miles west of San Antonio near the Mexico border. The school serves about 570 children, nearly 90% of them Latino.
• The school had children who were in second, third and fourth grade, a police spokesperson for the school said.
• Joe Biden addressed the nation on Tuesday night shortly after returning to the White House from a five-day trip to Asia. The president called for “common sense” gun laws and said “it’s time to turn this pain into action”.
• US Senator Chris Murphy, who came to Congress representing Sandy Hook, begged his colleagues to finally pass legislation addressing the nation’s gun violence problem. “What are we doing?” Murphy said. “I’m here on this floor to beg, to literally get down on my hands and knees to beg my colleagues. Find a path forward here. Work with us to find a way to pass laws that make this less likely.”
• Hal Harrell, superintendent of the Uvalde Consolidated Independent school district, said Tuesday that Robb elementary school will be closed and all school activities will be cancelled until further notice. Harrell also said grief counselors would be available starting Wednesday morning. “My heart is broken today,” Harrell said. “We’re a small community and we’re going to need your prayers to get through this.”

Trump, Abbott, and Cruz to attend NRA event in Texas later this week

In the wake of another horrific mass shooting, leading Republicans are set to speak at the National Rifle Association’s 2022 annual meeting on 27 May.

Texas governor Greg Abbott, who was the first to announce the shooting on Tuesday, is speaking at the conference. Former president Donald Trump is also scheduled to speak.

US Senator John Cornyn of Texas was also scheduled to attend but canceled due to “an unexpected change in his schedule that occurred before the Uvalde shooting”, according to the Texas Tribune.

The scheduled appearances come as politicians are under increased scrutiny for ties to gun lobbyists. In an emotional speech on Tuesday, president Joe Biden condemned those who stand in the way of “common sense” gun legislation.

“When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby?” he said. “Why are we willing to live with this carnage? Why do we keep letting this happen?”

The NRA in 2016 spent more than $50m to back Donald Trump and several Republican Senate candidates, according to the Trace, a nonprofit journalism outlet that tracks gun violence issues.

According to data from the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, Cruz and Cornyn have received $176,274 and $78,945 respectively from the NRA.

Abbott has been directly endorsed by the NRA in the past for his refusal to implement gun control laws. “Governor Abbott is a tireless defender of the right to keep and bear arms,” NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre said.

Republicans speak out against gun control in wake of another mass shooting

Senator Ted Cruz and other Republican politicians have spoken in opposition of gun control following the mass shooting in Texas on Tuesday. In a television interview Cruz said “when there is a crime of this kind it almost immediately gets politicized, and some use it to go after second amendment rights of law abiding citizens”, he said, calling such measures “not effective”.

In fact, studies have shown laws like universal background checks and other measures to prevent the distribution of weapons dramatically decreases death from gun violence.

According to the Houston Chronicle, Texas attorney General Ken Paxton also called for more weapons in schools to prevent shootings in the future.

“I’d much rather have law-abiding citizens, armed, trained so that they can respond when something like this happens, because it’s not going to be the last time,” he said.

Critics were quick to point out that the school district where Tuesday’s shooting occurred has its own police force including five officers, none of which “stopped today’s massacre”.

There was also an armed officer employed at Parkland High School in Florida, where another mass shooting occurred in 2018, who failed to stop the attack.

Obama: ‘It’s long past time for action’

In a series of tweets on Tuesday evening, former president Barack Obama said that “it’s long past time for action” on gun violence in the US. He said he and his wife Michelle “grieve with the families in Uvalde, who are experiencing pain no one should have to bear”.

“We’re also angry for them. Nearly ten years after Sandy Hook – and ten days after Buffalo – our country is paralyzed, not by fear, but by a gun lobby and a political party that have shown no willingness to act in any way that might help prevent these tragedies,” he said.

Obama was president when a 2012 mass shooting left more than two dozen dead at Sandy Hook elementary school in Connecticut, including 20 young children.

Obama has called that shooting “one of the darkest days” of his eight-year presidency.

The president has delivered remarks at the White House on today’s mass shooting. Footage of the talk can be found here.

“I had hoped when I became president I would not have to do this, again. Another massacre,” he began in an emotional speech.

Biden drew on his own experience with grief, having lost his first wife and young daughter in a car accident in 1972 and an adult son to cancer in 2015.

“To lose a child is like having a piece of your soul ripped away,” he said. “There’s a hollowness in your chest you feel like you’re being sucked into it … you’re never quite the same”

The president took a harsher tone when speaking about the need for “common sense” gun legislation. He spoke of the shooting in Buffalo ten days ago, and lamented that in both incidents an 18-year-old was able to purchase a gun and commit such heinous crimes.

“When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby?” he said. “Why are we willing to live with this carnage? Why do we keep letting this happen?”

“It is time to turn this pain to the action,” he said. “For every parent, every citizen of this country. We have to make it clear to every elected official in this country: it’s time to act. It’s time for those who obstruct or delay or blocked the common sense gun laws – we need to let you know that we will not forget.”

Biden’s speech came shortly after he returned to the White House from a multi-day trip to Asia.

‘One education under desks’: Poet and activist Amanda Gorman shares a poem on Texas shooting

US national youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman shared a poem on Twitter on Tuesday following the news of a mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas.

“Schools scared to death,” the poem reads. “The truth is, one education under desks, Stooped low from bullets; That plunge when we ask Where our children Shall live & how & if.”

The number of casualties from the shooting has reportedly risen to 21 as of Tuesday evening, including 18 children and three educators. Another woman, the grandmother of the deceased gunman, is in critical condition.

Biden to share statement on the Texas shooting

Joe Biden will be speaking from the White House momentarily about the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

Biden has ordered the flag of the US flown at half-staff at the White House and all federal grounds until sunset 28 May. Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden had been briefed on the matter and “his prayers are with the families impacted by this awful event”.

He also spoke with Texas governor Greg Abbott to offer assistance in the wake of the massacre.

Stay tuned for more updates.

The death toll in a mass shooting targeting an elementary school on Tuesday has now risen to 21, according to Texas state senator Roland Gutierrez, including 18 children and three adults.

Speaking on CNN, Gutierrez relayed the new numbers as he was told by Texas police officials in a private briefing.

Gutierrez called the event “devastating”.

“I can’t imagine what it would mean to send your child off to school in the morning and not have them return,” he said.

The senator also relayed a number of new details in how Tuesday’s horrific events unfolded. He said the suspect, 18-year-old Salvador Romas, shot his grandmother at her home in the morning and fled the scene by car before wrecking his vehicle outside the elementary school.

“He ran into the school and all this carnage proceeded to unfold after that time,” Gutierrez said.

Romas’ grandmother has been airlifted to a hospital in San Antonio and is in critical condition, he added.

Texas shooting the latest in a long line of mass violence in the US

The shooting on Tuesday marks just the latest of a seemingly ceaseless series of major mass casualty events in US history.

Just one week ago an 18-year-old man opened fire at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York in a racist attack targeted at the predominantly Black neighborhood. He killed ten and injured more.

A motive has not yet been revealed in Tuesday’s mass shooting. In Texas alone there have been eight mass shootings since 2009, including Tuesday’s, according to the Texas Tribune.

The shooting in Uvalde marks the deadliest school shooting since 2018, when three teachers and 14 students were killed in Parkland, Florida and the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012, in which 20 elementary school children and six faculty members were killed.

In 2022 thus far there have been at least 199 mass shootings across the United States, according to NPR, including the most recent two to shake the country.

At least 2,000 people have been killed or injured by mass shootings in the US since 1999, when shooters opened fire at Columbine High School in what was considered then an unprecedented attack.

In 2020, firearms surpassed auto accidents as the leading cause of death for children between the ages of 1 and 19 years old.