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UVALDE, Tex. – Texas Democratic Gov. Beto O’Rourke interrupted Gov. Greg Abbott during a news conference Wednesday at Uvalde High School as Republican Gov. was briefing reporters on Tuesday’s school shooting. .
O’Rourke, a former Texas congressman, approached the scene as Abbott introduced Texas Gov. Dan Patrick (R), and told lawmakers that it was time to act to prevent shootings. such as Robb Elementary School. , where 19 children and two teachers died on Tuesday.
Speaking on Patrick’s objections, O’Rourke said Abbott should have taken action after other high-profile mass shootings in Texas, such as Santa Fe High School in 2018 and a Walmart in El Paso on 2019.
“The time to stop the next shoot is right now and you’re not doing anything,” O’Rourke said. “You are not offering us anything.”
Patrick called O’Rourke, saying he was “offline” and “embarrassed.” Senator Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), Who was behind Abbott, told O’Rourke that “his.” Another official on stage, Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin, rose from a folding chair next to the stage and said O’Rourke was “a sick son of a b– – “for coming to the press conference” to ask a political question “.
Abbott mainly avoided eye contact with O’Rourke as he spoke and did not respond. When security officers began escorting O’Rourke out of the auditorium, he turned and pointed at Abbott.
“It’s up to you. Until you decide to do something, this will continue to happen,” O’Rourke said. “Someone has to defend the children of this state, or they will continue to be murdered.”
Elsewhere in the auditorium, some people were shouting, “Let him speak! Let him speak! “And” What happened to the First Amendment to the Constitution? Freedom of expression? “
Outside of high school, O’Rourke told reporters he had come to the press conference because “we owe something to our kids.”
“We owe it to the kids at the next school where a gunman with an AR-15 will come in unless we step in and stop him; we owe them something,” he said. “And that’s why I’m here.”
O’Rourke has openly spoken out on stricter gun control measures since a gunman opened fire on a Walmart and killed 23 people in his hometown of El Paso in 2019.
At the time, O’Rourke was one of nearly two dozen Democratic candidates running for president. He immediately left the campaign path to return to El Paso and unleashed his frustration with President Donald Trump and the media.
O’Rourke linked Trump and his inflammatory and anti-immigrant rhetoric to the racism that motivated the accused shooter, who said he was specifically targeting “Mexicans,” according to police.
“What do you think?” O’Rourke said then, when a reporter asked what else Trump could have done. “You know what … she’s been saying. She’s been calling Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. I don’t know, like members of the press, what the hell?
O’Rourke raised his hands: “It’s these questions that you know the answers to. I mean, connect the dots on what he’s been doing in this country. He doesn’t tolerate racism. He’s promoting racism.”
In a presidential primary debate a month after the shooting, O’Rourke said he would commit to the mandatory purchase of weapons such as AK-47 and AR-15 rifles if elected president.
“If it’s a weapon designed to kill people on a battlefield, if the high-impact, high-speed round when it hits your body destroys everything inside your body because it was designed to do so you bleed dead on a battlefield not being able to get up and kill one of our soldiers, “O’Rourke said on the stage of the debate. “When we see it being used against children … hell, yes, we’ll take your AR-15, your AK-47.”
Conservative politicians and right-wing activists would take advantage of this phrase: “Hell, yes, we’ll take your AR-15, your AK-47” – to paint O’Rourke as an extreme on the gun control issue .
Earlier this year, when asked about his 2019 comments in the middle of his campaign for governor, O’Rourke said he was “not interested in taking anything from anyone.”
“What I want to make sure we do is stand up for the Second Amendment,” he said in February.
O’Rourke later told the New York Times that he was not walking backwards in what he said about assault weapons, but was trying to focus on what he could “really do as a governor.” He said he still supported universal background checks and requirements for safe storage of weapons.
“I don’t think we should have AR-15s and AK-47s on the streets of this state; I’ve seen what my fellow Texans do in El Paso in 2019,” O’Rourke told the Times. “I haven’t changed any of that. I’m just telling you that I’m going to focus on what I can do as governor and where the common ground is.”
Wang and Yati reported from Washington.