WASHINGTON: President Trump has strongly condemned the hate crimes that claimed numerous lives in ELPaso Walmart and Ohio bar.
Ironically, Trump who himself had been vocal against immigrants that has to a certain extent fueled radicals all over USA, held: “Our nation must condemn racism, bigotry, and white supremacy,” he said, adding that he had directed the FBI to use all resources to combat “hate crimes and domestic terrorism”.
Furthermore, denouncing white supremacist extremism and racism he maintained that mass murderers should be quickly executed: “this capital punishment be delivered quickly, decisively, and without years of needless delay”. Though taking to the Tweeter Trump stated about increased background checks at the time of gun purchases, he failed to mention the same while addressing the nation.
Instead of blaming the easy availability of guns he focused on mental illness that according to him was the problem behind the rampages in schools, businesses and stores: “We must reform our mental health laws to better identify mentally disturbed individuals who may commit acts of violence and make sure those people not only get treatment, but when necessary, involuntary confinement…Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun.”
Relevant:
US President Donald Trump on Monday told a nation mourning the death of 31 people in two weekend mass shootings that he rejected racism and white supremacist ideology, moving to blunt criticism that his anti-immigrant rhetoric fuels violence.
As flags flew at half mast at the White House and across the country and the death toll edged up by two, Trump made an unusually direct condemnation of racists as he took on the role of consoler in chief.
But as the country tried to digest weekend shootings that left 22 dead at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas and another nine outside a bar in Dayton, Ohio, Trump offered little in the way of new ideas for a country awash with guns and painfully accustomed to mass shootings.
“Our nation must condemn racism, bigotry, and white supremacy,” Trump said.
He stressed that mental illness was the main culprit fueling mass shootings in America, as opposed to the ready availability of firearms or extremist thinking, as argued by gun control advocates.
At the sites of America’s latest massacres — numbers 250 and 251 so far this year — people came to honor the dead.
Makeshift memorials with candles, flowers, heart-shaped balloons and posters with messages of condolence sprang up outside the Walmart in Texas and the Dayton bar.
“You are loved,” read an inscription on a small yellow cardboard heart placed outside the Ned Peppers Bar.
Outside the Walmart store that was attacked Saturday, people paused to pay their respects at the memorial. Balloons shaped like stars — Texas is the Lone Star State — fluttered in the morning breeze.
One poster read: “A date never to forget: August 3, 2019.”
In his brief address, Trump made no mention of two ideas he had tweeted hours earlier: tightening background checks for gun buyers and linking gun control reform to changes in immigration law.
The president did say he supported “red flag” laws allowing authorities to confiscate weapons from people believed to present grave risks.
Many people were grateful that even more were not killed in Ohio.
In Texas, 25 people were wounded, and another 26 were hurt in Ohio, where the shooter was killed in roughly 30 seconds by police who were patrolling nearby.
Two of those wounded in Texas died Monday.
Dayton Police Chief Richard Biehl told a news conference Sunday that the quick police response was crucial, preventing the shooter from entering a bar where “there would have been… catastrophic injury and loss of life.”
Biehl said the shooter wore a mask and a bullet-proof vest and was armed with an assault rifle fitted with a 100-round drum magazine.
Police named the gunman as a 24-year-old white man called Connor Betts and said his sister was among those killed. She had gone with him to the scene of the shootings.
Police said Monday they had no evidence so far that race played a part in the Dayton shooting.
In Texas, police said the suspect surrendered on a sidewalk near the scene of the massacre. He was described in media reports as a 21-year-old white man named Patrick Crusius.
He was believed to have posted online a manifesto denouncing a “Hispanic invasion” of Texas. El Paso, on the border with Mexico, is majority Latino.
Seven of those killed in the El Paso shooting were Mexican, the country’s foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard, said Sunday.
The manifesto posted shortly before the shooting also praises the killing of 51 Muslims at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand in March.
Police said the suspected shooter has been charged with capital murder and could face the death penalty, and a federal official said investigators are treating the El Paso shooting as a case of domestic terrorism.
Despite a string of horrific mass shootings in the US, where gun culture is deep-rooted, efforts to strengthen firearms regulations remain divisive.
The latest two shootings capped a particularly bloody week for gun violence: three people died in a shooting at a food festival last Sunday in California, and two more Tuesday in a shooting in a Walmart in Mississippi.
On Twitter Saturday, Trump described the El Paso attack as “an act of cowardice.”
But critics said the president’s habit of speaking in derogatory terms about immigrants is pushing hatred of foreigners into the political mainstream and encouraging white supremacism.
“To pretend that his administration and the hateful rhetoric it spreads doesn’t play a role in the kind of violence that we saw yesterday in El Paso is ignorant at best and irresponsible at worst,” said the Southern Poverty Law Center, a major civil rights group.
It cited Trump actions like calling Mexican migrants rapists and drug dealers and doing nothing when a crowd at a Trump rally chanted “send her back” in reference to a Somali-born congresswoman.
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Relevant pieces published earlier:
EL PASO: US President Donald Trump will address the nation on Monday after two shootings left 29 people dead and sparked accusations that his rhetoric was part of the problem.
The rampages turned innocent snippets of everyday life into nightmares of bloodshed: 20 people were shot dead while shopping at a crowded Walmart in El Paso, Texas on Saturday morning, and nine more outside a bar in a popular nightlife district in Dayton, Ohio just 13 hours later.
Trump will again find himself in the role of consoler-in-chief after a tragedy — which he has struggled with in the past — when he speaks at 10:00 am (1400 GMT).
Following the shootings, Trump said “hate has no place in our country,” but he also blamed mental illness for the violence.
“These are really people that are very, very seriously mentally ill,” he said, despite the fact that police have not confirmed this to be the case.
“We have to get it stopped. This has been going on for years… and years in our country,” he said.
In Texas, 26 people were wounded, and 27 in Ohio, where the shooter was killed in roughly 30 seconds by police who were patrolling nearby.
EL PASO: While people were busy mostly purchasing back-to-school supplies here at Wal-Mart, 10.30AM on Saturday (3rdof August, 2019) a gunman opened fire shooting randomly killing 20 and injuring 26 shoppers and employees.
It seems that the mass murder was a hate-crime carried out by a 21-year-old white male identified as Patrick Crusius from Allen Texas. The gunman surrendered to Police a block away from the scene of crime.
According to the sources the manifesto written by the shooter (who expected to be killed during the mass killing) was circulated online, Text also harbored sentences railing the Hispanic invasion of Texas.
At the time of shooting between 1000-3000 costumers were busy shopping at the Wal-Mart. Since many parents and grand parents were buying back-to-school-related items with their kids, those injured include from 2-year-old toddler to 82-year-old grandpa.
It is pertinent to mention here while just six days ago a teenage gunman opened fire at a summer food fest in N. California, hours later Police killed a gunman in Dayton Ohio who killed ten people, and injured another sixteen.
President Trump also took to the Twitter stating: “Terrible shootings in El Paso, Texas. Reports are very bad, many killed. Working with State and Local authorities, and Law Enforcement. Spoke to Governor to pledge total support of Federal Government. God be with you all!…Today’s shooting in EL Paso, Texas was not only tragic it was an act of cowardice. I know that I stand with everyone in this Country to condemn today’s hateful act. There are no reasons or excuses that will ever justify killing innocent people…Melania and I send our heartfelt thoughts and prayers to the great people of Texas…God be with you all”.
Relevant:
OHIO: The Media was still busy reporting the hate crime that took place in Texas (resulting into death of 20 people), in less than 24 hours, Dayton police here took to the Twitter to inform about an active shooter situation in the Oregon District.
According to details a gunman resorted to fire indiscriminately killing nine and injuring another 16 at around 1.07AM (5,07GMT). But Police officers nearby were able to put an end to it quickly as they managed to shoot the gunmen dead at the scene within a minute of him opening fire.
Commenting on the quick response Assistant Police Chief Matt Carper, while talking to reporters said: “Our people are very well trained for a situation like this.. (it was) very fortunate that the officers were in close proximity”.
Mayor Nan Whaley has informed that the injured were being treated in several hospitals throughout the city. Though she lauded the quick response of the Police personnel that prevented further deaths, she noted it would be very difficult time for the families of the victims.
She said that as a mayor that was a day “we all dread happening. What’s very sad is I’ve got messages from mayors across the country – it’s sad that we’ve all gone through it.”
So far Police has not been able to identify the shooter nor his motive is yet known.
This was the 22nd mass killing in the US during 2019. Altogether the 22 shootings claimed 125 lives so fa
