After Uvalde: Guns, Grief & Texas Politics (full documentary) | FRONTLINE

[Music] Horror in Uvalde Texas one year after the Uvalde school massacre the gunman kills 19 Elementary School students and two adults futuru media's Maria inohosa examines the police response the officers understood that the weapon was a war style weapon it's initial purpose was to kill humans efficiently it is very good at that that is why it is so popular in mass shootings the community's promo at this point families should be at home grieving but instead we're still out here demanding change [Music] enough is enough to do something now so what are you telling the families hope for everything expect nothing and hopefully we get a little bit of something would you vote to raise the age today I would not now I'm on Frontline in collaboration with the Texas Tribune after Uvalde guns grief and Texas politics this program contains mature content which may not be suitable for all audiences viewer discretion is advised [Music] every two years the Texas legislature comes to session [Music] it's early 2023 and the capital is a busy place the Senate of the 88th legislative session will come to order lawmakers are voting on bills about everything from the cost of fuel to property taxes many without controversy is there an objection to the adoption of the resolution the chair here's none the resolution's adopted but in this session the legislature is also facing the divisive issue of guns it's none of your business how many guns I own after one of the deadliest school shootings in history we defend the Constitution we do everything to protect these guns let's just try something to protect our children [Music] imaginable tragedy in Texas a gunman opened fire at Robb Elementary on May 24 2022 accounts of yet another mass shooting in our country began to hit the news armed with a long rifle clad in body armor within days of his 18th birthday a young man legally bought two AR-15 style weapons and a week later walked into his old fourth grade classroom and opened fire death toll in the Uvalde school massacre stands at 19 kids to adults [Music] shortly after the massacre I did a story about the Uvalde shooting for my podcast Latino USA today Uvalde resiste I spoke to many people who were reeling from the tragedy everybody's devastated I'm so sorry for your loss George pray for you all day for the last year I haven't been able to stop thinking about these families and about Uvalde there are still so many questions what if anything could have been done to prevent this tragedy and how is this predominantly Latino Community responding the thing about Uvaldi is that it is any place USA with a strip and fast food Etc and now it's on the map for this horrific tragedy the first big sign that you see is for the Oasis Outback it looks like it's a restaurant the thing is that it's a restaurant that also has a gun shop it's also where the AR-15 that was used in the massacre was picked up from I need to know what does a place like Uvalde do after a horrific tragedy like this what do you do [Music] Rob Elementary parent this phone call is for you please know at this time Rhonda Elementary is under a lockdown status due to gunshots in the area students and staff are safe in the building this building is secure in a lockdown status Gladys Gonzalez was one of hundreds of parents who received this automated message on the morning of May 24th I didn't know really what was going on soon after I received a call from my husband he tells me you know there is a gunman inside the school and just not knowing how my daughter was or what where she was it was just it was the worst feeding gladys's ten-year-old daughter Caitlyn was in the fourth grade she had a phone I kept calling her I kept messaging her you had no idea if Caitlyn was alive and I didn't know I didn't know until maybe two three hours later he has an AR-15 he's shot a whole bunch of times what have you learned about what Caitlyn experienced Caitlyn was in room 106. and it was a room that was across where the massacre happened from what her teacher has told me the kids huddled together close to her desk she remembers a lot of the screams and you know a lot of the chaos she could hear the police out in the hallways Gladys learned that officers broke the windows of classrooms across the hall from the gunman and began evacuating students you're okay buddy you're okay we're gonna get you over this all right Caitlyn was one of them all the way to the fence all the way to the fence so what happened when you actually were able to finally see and meet up with Caitlin she just gave me the biggest hug she gave me the biggest hug and I told her you're safe now mama mommy's here shooter 18 is dead some families are getting that news they didn't want to receive this evening that night my husband and I didn't sleep at all just watching the news Horror in Uvalde Texas tonight after a gunman kills 19 Elementary School students and two adults tonight as investigators gather evidence we are learning about some of the victims Caitlyn wakes up and she said I wonder where Jackie is might then I already knew Caitlyn lost many of her friends on May 24th including her very best friend nine-year-old Jackie casares the two of them had been Inseparable for years do you mind if I use my fingers I don't mind at all I don't really know what I'm doing but I'm gonna figure it out I'm inspired by you because you're like the artist here back where you live in New York do you hear chickens no what do you think I need to do maybe some red no yellow yellow kind of sprinkled throughout so tell me about BFF tell me more about Jackie she is funny her laugh was funny she snorted well when did you meet oh she was on a swing when she was playing by herself so I asked her she wanted to play with me and she said yes and then we kept talking and yeah do you talk to Caitlin about that day I try not to bring it up and but there's just a part of her that has become obsessed in wanting to understand what happened why they didn't go in when they had the chance a very profound Obsession for a 10 year old to have yeah you know the one place where she was supposed to have been safe and she wasn't after the shooting heroic accounts of how officers responded played out in the news the bottom line is that law enforcement was there they did engage immediately they did contain them in the classroom they showed amazing Courage by running toward gunfire for the singular purpose of trying to save lives but soon those accounts came under scrutiny tonight there are questions about why 100 officers at the scene took more than 75 minutes to neutralize the gunman Caitlyn's father Nev Gonzalez still can't understand why officers waited so long I'm an army veteran that's what they instilled in me is to protect I really feel that if I was there I would have stopped the threat somehow when you take a note to protect and serve you do so knowing that in any time any minute of the hour your life can be cut short and it didn't happen it didn't happen why parents are making fresh demands for accountability we're angry we're very angry and we want Justice for our kids when my niece was in that classroom dying waiting for you to help where were you the events of May 24th were captured on dozens of cameras hours of police body camera and security footage [Music] several months we've been working with reporters at the Texas Tribune who obtained and reviewed much of that footage this video footage shows what the police response was to the shooting give me the timing of sure so this particular moment is about three minutes after the shooter enters the school he has already fired about a hundred rounds inside those two adjoining classrooms he has entered this is when the first officers enter the school so I'm going to play that there will be gunfire in it he Fires at them two officers both struck with fragments that passed through the door through the walls of the classroom and drives them back and that's a really important thing to understand because it affects how they respond the rest of the way you those particular gunshots that we hear will these officers immediately know oh that's an AR-15 if you are someone who's experienced with guns like you would know oh that was a rifle careful with the windows Facing East have a male subject was an AR CH okay so this is where the response starts to fall apart the officers stationed themselves at the end of this hallway after they're initially driven back they don't re-engage the shooter that is not what they are trained to do since the Columbine shooting in 1999 they're supposed to engage active Shooters until they are subdued they do not wait for background they do not wait for more equipment the more time you wait more people can get killed and the people that wounded can die you do not wait for anything that is what's supposed to happen that is very clearly what does not happen here you can see as I scrub through over the next 40 minutes more officers arrive more offices arrive [Music] more rifles arrive [Music] Shield arrives two more Shields arrive more offices arrive most if not all of The Killing took place before police had the opportunity to intervene but there's a lot of evidence that builds throughout this time that yes there are students and teachers in the classroom that some of them been shot and that some of them need immediate medical attention even when like more reliable information is coming out about the seriousness of the situation um that information is not flowing well among police but they are well aware that these type of rounds because of their high velocity will penetrate their normal body armor I don't know if I've really heard emphasized in much of the coverage or reporting that the AR-15 can shoot through regular police body armor the Texas Tribune obtained interviews with officers conducted as part of federal and state investigations into the shooting the way he was shooting he's probably going to take all of us out I'm just waiting for those rounds to hit me that 223 round would have gone right to you did anybody gone through that door yes sir he would have killed whoever it was this type of rifle was originally designed for military use its initial purpose was to kill humans efficiently it is very good at that that is why it is so popular in mass shootings and in wars and in Wars [Music] in the 1950s the AR-10 was developed as a military rifle then its successor the AR-15 was made available to civilians and marketed to Hunters and Sportsmen but in the 1980s gun companies expanded their Outreach to law enforcement and to people who feared a rise in crime purchase of the weapon was banned in 1994 but the law expired after a decade over the years this type of gun has become a weapon of choice for Mass Shooters [Music] AR-15 style Firearms were used in Las Vegas San Bernardino Parkland Buffalo and Pittsburgh in 2022 seven of the 12 mass shootings in the U.S involved at least one AR-15 style weapon images obtained by the Texas Tribune show that the Uvalde gunman researched the AR-15 and the ease of purchasing it once he turned 18. on his birthday and the days after he was able to legally buy two AR-15 style weapons and hundreds of rounds of ammunition ready dude 95 [Music] as the city's only pediatrician Dr Roy Guerrero has cared for many of uvalde's children since they were babies so if anyone asks you they're three foot six sound good and he's seen firsthand just how much damage the AR-15 can do so it's May 24 2022 just talk to me about that morning so I get to the hospital I know something's wrong because there's doctors and nurses running everywhere there's a few people that are injured they're stabilized there's these kids with minor injuries and then you start to wonder uh where's everybody else so I asked whether the nurses all these kids I see here is this everyone that's here they're like no there's some deceased children in the back so they took me back there and that's truly when I realized the caliber of what these weapons can do to a child's body so imagine a child who is decapitated that's it what else do I have to tell you huge chest wounds where it seems like you know someone bore a hand through the whole chest the only consolens I have to myself is maybe it was so fast that they didn't have time to to suffer that they went quickly maybe not peacefully but quickly I mean you're reduced to saying that to parents what else can I do because I couldn't have done anything for them that day nothing there's people saying well maybe we should show the mortuary pictures of these kids that were taken after they pass pictures of these kids in their coffins pictures of funerals Emmett Till's mother made a decision to have an open casket and it kind of Changed History maybe that's what it takes whether you want to believe it or not this is what happened that day these type of weapons they're able to inflict so much damage and death so quickly and ferociously compared to other weapons and if you turn 18 in Texas you can go buy one tomorrow what do you want to see immediately I mean if is there something tangible that you're like at a minimum ultimately what I would want is a ban that's the ultimate goal which I know I'm not going to get I think it's going to take a few brave people at the state level to where we can start to get our voices heard LED legislature in Texas the idea of restricting access to guns is typically a non-starter it's a deeply polarizing issue but after Uvalde some Democrats have been trying to crack open the door they introduced two separate bills in the Senate and the house to raise the legal age to purchase certain weapons like the AR-15 from 18 to 21. we're going to go to a strategy session with the families I need a room in a hotel or we can have lunch or in a restaurant the author of the Senate Bill Roland Gutierrez arrived in Uvalde just hours after the shooting [Music] I got there on day one and I stood there as families who were informed that their children had passed on I heard screams that I had never heard in my life when they haunt me still today shouldn't be partisan how in the world can we not have a law that says an 18 year old shouldn't have this type of weapon we have an age limit on a handgun an 18 year old can't go buy a handgun but he can go buy an AR-15 put your head around that one so you believe that just raising the age from 18 to 21 is the bare minimum that possibly could happen I think it can happen and that's why we filed it it's not going to prevent this from happening again but let's make it a little harder those folks in your Valley are not asking for the moon and stars here they're asking for a little bit of Common Sense but what the senator calls common sense is considered a violation by many Republicans and gun owners in Texas what is your opinion about the bill to raise the age to raise the age we are against it we don't think it's a good idea what is your major concern major concern is an infringement on our Second Amendment rights we have people in the state government we have people in the federal government that are trying to take away our rights we think that they swore an oath to the Constitution and they are failing to honor their their oath to the Constitution should it be easy for an 18 year old to get an assault weapon in the state of Texas I think it should be easy for an 18 year old to get a weapon to defend himself from somebody who wants to do him harm so yeah we already have laws that are against murder this kid didn't care so if you make a law that says he can't get a gun at 18 guess what he doesn't care what the law is he's going to go get a gun from somewhere so what do you say to the parents is the solution we Advocate that governments allow teachers to get the training and to carry into schools so you're just like what should have happened in uvaldez there should have been a teacher in that classroom with an assault rifle yeah or close to it we've learned through time you can't wait on law enforcement to show up and save you you got to be your own personal self-defense Governor Greg Abbott says the state can't raise the minimum age to purchase AR style rifles as some have clearly pushed for especially in the wake of the Uvalde school shooting it is clear that the gun control law that they are seeking in Uvalde as much as they may want it it has already been ruled to be unconstitutional Governor Abbott has said that the bill that you support is a violation of the Second Amendment that might be his opinion the fact is states can regulate guns in the wake of mass shootings some states have changed laws several have restricted access no 18 year old can walk in on their birthday and walk out with an AR-15 those days are over we will require all individuals purchasing Firearms to be 21 or older While others have loosened regulations a new law making it easier to get a handgun in North Carolina guns now welcome in the pews despite the uphill battle in Texas a group of local families from Uvalde have stepped into the spotlight to push for new gun restrictions we demand Governor Abbott call a special session to raise the minimum age raise the minimum age to purchase assault weapon to 21. these [Music] these even students from Rob Elementary like Caitlyn Gonzalez have spoken out [Applause] get on your own bought a gun to kill kids that does not make sense [Applause] discovered the power of her voice when families confronted the Uvalde school board about the actions of their police chief on the day of the massacre the law enforcement's job is to [Music] I have messages for a PR Hernando and all the law enforcement that were there that date her in her badge and step down you don't deserve to wear one before they adjourned the school board voted to fire the police chief who decried the motion and insisted he and officers tried to keep the children safe not everyone in Uvalde supported the termination or the calls for more gun restrictions but for some the demand for change continued we discussed I mean demonstrations you know having picket lines a long-standing activist and Community member has been supporting the effort now we've got to figure out what's going to be the next step when this tragedy happened I saw that the uh the families were very upset so I started getting involved at this point families should be at home grieving but instead we're still out here demanding change it's hard to just stay still and not do anything when you've been affected we need to fight for it we need to stand up for it and whatever it takes whatever it takes Caitlyn what's going on for you as you're looking at this and here at this meeting it's amazing what do you feel in your heart proud of them you're proud of them because they use their voice like I'm using mine [Music] there's a long history of this kind of activism in Uvalde [Music] those are students they're coming out of class wait there's my school yeah in 1970 la lo Castillo helped organize one of the longest School walkouts in American history hundreds of students protested across Uvalde after one of the only Latino teachers was let go from Rob Elementary well that's a lot of people in order for something like that to be effective you've got to have the numbers how long did it last the workout lasted six weeks this is a little scriptbook that I kept from the high school this is my sophomore year Maria Elena Martinez was 15 when she joined the walkout she and many of her fellow students were taking what they called a stand against pervasive discrimination after years of poor treatment in the Uvalde school system so tell me what it was like growing up and you're speaking Spanish it was certainly discouraged and you were punished verbally physically my first grade teacher if you spoke Spanish she would slap you with a wet ruler on your calf and it would sting it would hurt in the seventh grade one teacher in June said stop looking at me you're a bunch of donkeys and cows with those big brown eyes put your hands down that was in junior high I experienced a lot of things that were not right that were ingested were abusive we said you know Basta enough is enough students demands included bilingual education better treatment of students and the hiring of more Mexican-American teachers we walked out to jeers and sneers Texas Rangers would come by and nudge you pull the rifle close to you I mean there were helicopters as well and they'd zoom over and there would be police and Texas Rangers on the roof with rifles pointing guns at us that was scary but we stayed looking forward and marching it was a movement towards fairness Justice and equality for all just like the Constitution says in the end none of the students demands were met but Uvalde would begin to transform what changed after the walkout in Uvalde well actually nothing changed we had to force the change one of the things that that happened was that during the walkout we created a lot of activists some of these youngsters ran for office city council city mayor the school board and a lot of change took place because of that [Music] if you think about what's happening now in Uvaldi and you think about what happened in Uvalde in 1970. in both cases the children are rising up yes one out of Injustice and one out of grief grief and tragedy yeah what we did in the rain oh yeah when you think about the fact that now Caitlyn is listening to you saying I want to know more Lalo I love it I mean if one person you know takes the torch and runs with it I'm totally satisfied Caitlyn has quickly become one of the most visible faces of the movement for the proposed gun laws alongside her mom they've taken their fight to the Capitol on this day outside the legislature they're joined by more than a dozen Uvalde families and relatives of mass shooting victims from all around the country I want to introduce you to the strongest people I've ever met in my life and there are these people that are behind me today do not forget the names of their children we're here to tell this governor do something to avoid the killing of our children do something to make it harder for an 18 year old to access an AR-15 do something now do something now do something else thank you and thank these families from the bottom of the world Gonzalez [Applause] good afternoon on May 24th everything changed as soon as we got to our class we heard the gunshots he walked with my hemogram love you Caitlyn look at me while you're telling me tell me the story [Music] he won't put the doorknob he baked on my door I heard I remember hearing my best friend screams and the next day I got the news from my mom the worst news that any child should get I shouldn't have to be here speaking I'm only 10 years old but I am because my friends have no voice no more thank you for your guys's time have a wonderful day [Applause] [Music] after the rally Caitlyn and the family spend the day at the Capitol lobbying and meeting with lawmakers they get a cordial reception but no commitments so what happens next the bill has been referred to the state affairs committee we're talking to the chairman to see if we can get that issue heard I've told my staff we're going to exhaust ourselves for the next 90 days because that's all that's left it's 90 days and nothing gets done for another two years so what are you telling the families when they come and they have the energy and there's a protest and and you're saying hope for everything expect nothing and hopefully we get a little bit of something for Bill in the house was also uncertain strictly in Texas there is this constant fear of all-powerful government and we don't like being told what to do representative Travis Clardy is a republican who's been in the legislature for over a decade and has served on the house Public Safety Committee we're talking about limiting in a prospective way when someone can buy a firearm that's going to do nothing to the huge inventory of weapons already in private hands in in the public domain I own guns I'm not saying how many I could probably outfit the invasion of a small Caribbean island I'm not the exception in Texas I'm the rule my understanding of my time with some of the families in Uvalde is that they actually own guns so they're in support of people having guns they're not saying take away the guns they're not saying you know ban all assault weapons what they're simply saying is raise the age I think that's a measure that we can look at and we ought to look at I think there's broad support for it but I also don't want anybody to think that that is going to be a Panacea would you vote to raise the age you know right now today I would not today I would not but I will tell you that that day may come more or less I would not want to do it today is I want to get back home and have those conversations with the people I represent but I think what I will hear is people saying I'm against any registration I'm against these things don't limit what I can buy I shouldn't have to do anything else but it should be 21. I think even in rural East Texas there is a general acceptance that there's some wisdom in that we can't keep doing the same thing and fall back in the same routine so how do we break out of that cycle how do we come up with solutions that will work in a complicated world foreign ERS at the Tribune and propublica have been analyzing the actions of lawmakers in Texas after incidents like Uvalde we might have now legislatively what happens after this mass shootings we counted at least 19 mass shootings and here is where you know we started in 1966 with the UT Tower shooting and and you can see as the years go on they seem to be more frequent the number of people killed in injured going up we see that the types of weapons are increasingly semi-automatic rifles we came up with a list of at least two dozen bills that could have made it illegal for the the shooter to acquire that firearm legally so in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin Tara rained down from the tower the University campus resembled a battlefield is there any legislation that actually makes it to the floor as a result then okay and then 1991 the Luby's shooting that's 23 people the government goes on a rampage in a Texas cafeteria the worst mass shooting in American history did any legislation make it to the floor no then you have the Fort Hood shootings in 2009. 13 people killed did any legislation make it to the floor in terms of gun control no so basically the final status of all of these bills over and over again this didn't make it to the floor didn't make it to the floor didn't make it to the floor nothing happened nothing happened no no you know there's always the argument that you hear from lawmakers well if someone really wants to commit such act they're gonna find a way no matter what but what we found is that at least it wouldn't have been legal for them to acquired it six of the mass shootings the Texas Tribune and propublica had analyzed took place while the current governor has been in office one of them another school shooting The Honorable Greg Abbott in his 2019 State of the State speech Governor Abbott responded to the shooting in Santa Fe he didn't mention the divisive issue of guns but focused instead on what he pointed to as the real problem [Music] the need to address mental health in our schools many of our of our universities already have mental health programs to identify and remove students who pose a Potential Threat and to provide students with the help they need well school districts across the entire State deserve access to these very same services the same year 2019 the governor approved a Telehealth program called t-chat that launched in some school districts counselors were trained to spot red flags that a teenager might be on a dangerous path and connect them to mental health support [Music] teenager like the gunman who attacked Robb Elementary a report from the Texas House of Representatives investigative committee provides details of a troubled past two separate Witnesses a girlfriend and a cousin said he talked about suicide the report states that he had developed sociopathic tendencies and had missed more than a hundred days of school before being kicked out for poor performance and lack of attendance know if the t-chat Intervention Program would have made a difference the first wave of funding was not enough to expand the program Statewide so t-chat didn't reach Uvalde until after the massacre in this session the Texas legislature proposed billions of dollars of increased spending on Mental Health in the state [Music] at the University of Texas at Austin Professor Jim Henson has been tracking the politics around gun policy and mental health what we're seeing now is a willingness in this legislative session to spend more money on Mental Health talk about mental health it resonates as a non-gun related explanation and remedy for mass shootings that will work for Republican policy makers and Republican candidates they would like to have some appearance of bipartisan cooperation mental health is a great Avenue for that because Democrats are going to be amenable to legislate on Mental Health even if it means trading off on gun policy you've been watching the Capital Texas State politics for a long time do you think that the families and their activism can in fact change the politics well I think it's a tall order I'm honestly a little bit skeptical at this point there are some very deeply embedded patterns in these attitudes among Republicans and Democrats in Texas that are you know meeting with the institutional reality of what we're seeing in partisan politics in the state right now I wanted to talk to Governor Abbott about the gun proposals and the politics it's Maria inojosa we would really appreciate it if the governor would sit down with us and answer a couple of questions we'd really like to hear from him directly I would love to hear back from you thank you he didn't agree to an interview is this where you come to talk to Jackie on one of my last visits to Uvalde Gladys and Caitlin take me to the cemetery to visit her best friend Jackie you ready [Music] oh my God it's beautiful let's make hearts for so many here it's a place that has become as familiar as home and now for Jackie we feel you Jackie so pretty [Music] almost a year has passed since the Uvalde Massacre for those who hope this tragedy would be a Tipping Point and result in changes when it comes to gun laws time is running out there's only six weeks left in the session so Senator when we were last here there was supposed to be potentially movement on your bill 145. that's right will it make it through to the floor for any debate in this session it's not likely it's not likely it's quite obvious that they are not willing to have a conversation at least in the Texas Senate on Common Sense gun Safety Solutions while the Senate Bill appears to have stalled lawmakers in the house have agreed to hear testimony from Uvalde families [Music] Speaker of the House made a decision that we should hear these people out they deserve at least that moment to tell their story [Music] to a change I believe that it's led to a point where having this hearing that's something [Music] other bills are scheduled to be heard it will be a long day before the families will get their turn to testify select committee on community safety will come to order chair now lays out while I wait I get a chance to speak to Jackie's parents rodia and Javier gasares we're not trained to take anybody's guns away it's just gone on for so long that we have to meet somewhere in the middle and how is raising the age not in the middle I'm a good owner I can still carry we just want to make this better and safer place for my daughter not anymore but somebody else's child how many times have you been to this state capitol you never become one of these twice a month maybe three times a month it is it's lost cow we've met parents from different shootings and a lot of them have been doing this for years we've only been doing this for 11 months and we're exhausted but we're not giving up hours pass scheduling purposes after this bill we've got a few more witnesses on this one and then we're going to go to the trees picture now lays out House Bill 2744 then just before 10 pm Mrs chairman King to explain the measure Democrat Tracy O King explains why he authored the bill I'm a gun guy and uh the last time we had a big campaign and NRA endorsed me I have an a rating with the NRA or I did open till this session but at 11 30 on May 24 2022 everything changed ladies and gentlemen had House Bill 2744 been the law in the state of Texas that attacker would not have been able to buy that weapon one by one the families from Uvalde come forward to address the committee I wonder if on May 24th you watched coverage of Uvalde unfold and wondered what you could have done to prevent this tragedy did you imagine what it would feel like to bury your child also my nine-year-old daughter raped in a white sheet cold and alone in an operating room I saw the wound that took her life I had no idea that I love you Daddy would be the last words I would ever hear come at it for a little mouth I'm just a mom I'm not even sure which one of you exactly or sometimes are Democratic or Republicans I don't care I just don't want any of you to sit here where I'm sitting I don't want you to have to identify your child's body based on what he was wearing to school that day enough is enough please do something do something now thank you all right thank you opponents of the bill also come forward Tara Mitchell representative of NRA opposed to house bill 2744. we represent 18 19 and 20 year olds who are not mass shooters our military is 18 to 20 years old for the most part you're saying that they aren't mature enough to own a gun raising the age to 21 will not change the fact that murder is already illegal and someone who is intent on murder will not be deterred from committing murder just because the Age 2 purchase was raised I don't want to create false hope in a bill that will ultimately be found unconstitutional I do think we need to find a solution that will stay permanent I do believe it is a mental problem and it seems to be getting worse in this country the problem is not the gun voices on both sides they reflect the Deep divisions when it comes to guns in this country and even after tragedies like Uvalde the only thing that seems certain is that something like it is bound to happen again before the legislative session ended in Texas there were yet more deaths from assault weapons in the state five people shot and killed in East Texas and eight people gunned down at a mall outside of Dallas including three children days after the second shooting the house committee voted to advance the bill one step closer to consideration by the Full House [Applause] [Music] two Republicans joined the effort it was an emotional moment for the families but it was largely symbolic [Music] in the end when the 88th legislative session closed on May 29th neither the house bill nor the Senate bill made it to the floor it will be another two years before the families can try again [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] programs visit our website at pbs.org Frontline [Music] front lines after Uvalde guns grief and Texas politics is available on Amazon Prime video [Music]

Channel: FRONTLINE PBS | Official

Views: 134,054

Keywords:

Id: w8TSDbLr7_s

Length: 53min 18sec (3198 seconds)

Published: Tue May 30 2023

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[u/Jean_dodge67]

PBS.com will have it online by now.

https://twitter.com/AmanpourCoPBS/status/1664350705392525316?s=20

Tonight there will be a segment on the "making of" and promotion with Hinijosa on the Amanpour show - an house show and she has three guests so I guess they wil give this ten to 20 minutes time. Might get a update of sorts from it too, since the edit only goes up to last week or so's events.

[u/Jean_dodge67]

Don't forget PBS always includes some web-only bonus content with programs like this. I just finished seeing this last night. FRONTLINE is often some of the best television has to offer. It's always independent producers and they are often some of the best speaking to top experts.

Maria Hinojosa is an experienced and well-respected NPR affiliated journalist and features reporter, you probably heard her on Latino USA on an NPR station.

Having said all that, this is not forward looking investigative journalism it's got a bit of a "let's take a look back and make some conclusions and pronouncements" air to it. And that's good but sometimes they are better at explaining corruption and here it' more of the "give them enough rope" to the pro-gun politicians and not to much if anything at all about how the coverup and partisan political fight regarding how the truth is redacted here.

It's got a good profile of Caitlyn Gonzales that is inspiring, the ten year old activist from room 106, whose best friend Jackie died.

The section on why the LEOs delayed starts around 11 minutes in, and highlights the partnership of the producers and FRONTLINE with the Texas Tribune, so Zach Despart is the main interview there. Despart shows the on-camera host Hinojosa the initial team north and south running away and then fast-forwasrs fror the next hour of the hallway. Then they move into the aspects of the AR-15 and officers fear of that weapons system.

We don't get into issues of command and control really at that point, which is fine, but it does show you the general message that the Texas Tribune is pushing editorially.

At 15 minutes in or so, Zach Despart makes a pronouncement that's more or less the conventional wisdom / consensus opinion that the officers were not present for the main massacre, which is true but he doesn't address the fact that multiple officers were on or at campus before the shooter got into the building, and that irks me to no end. Not only was there a huge missed opportunity there, they worked hard to lie and obfuscate about it after. I want that to be known and spoken about and of course reposted to by authorities but it didnt happen here.

"Most if not all the killing took place before police had the opportunity to intervene," Despart pronounces and I strongly disagree with that assessment. I think he means well and it's broadly true in a way, but he's mis-coloring the event as I see it. They had a good chance to intervene when the shooter was in the parking lot, and the school officer who drove onto the playground made a bold and sincere effort to do so - at first, in his vehicle. (if that's his shadow from the south door we see, it is visible ten seconds after the gunman enters the classroom and he's there awaiting backup for some time.)

But the ones who piled up at the wreck - three cop cars in all, and possibly more on Geraldine we dont see, including Maldonado and Ruiz - all failed to press forward when they had a huge advantage - the shooter on foot in the parking lot, three men with cars and guns, maybe more. Canales is on record as seeing the shooter WITH AN AR-15 in the parking lot. None pressed forward. It's possible Coronado never saw him enter. Hard to say for sure. But technically there was opportunity to intervene, and even efforts to intervene. So, nuance. And no video to show this, so no TV dramatic moment. But video exists, it's just been corruptly hidden.

And it's odd because the other line of thinking Despart and the Trib pushes somewhat is the "officers feared the AR-15," which is not wrong, it's just a bit more nuanced than that, IMO. They seemingly feared it in the parking lot, too. But I sure wish someone had driven into the teacher's lot and blocked the west door or just run the little sociopath down with their cop car. Perhaps hindsight is 20-20.

And they feared the AR-15 behind a closed (they thought locked) door, too. So much so that they called for a federal tactical team rather than use their own, elders of which were already present. Again, complexity that television doesn't deal with well and the producers here seem to take direction from their partner the Texas Tribune but failed to avail themselves of the full "trove" (Zach Despart's own words) of leaked videos and investigation materials. That' the rub, they aren't investigating Uvalde at Front-line, they are wrapping up and presenting the issues as if it is a done deal, historical fact, water under the bridge and maybe it is but it's water colored red with lies and blood that needs to be spoke to, not let pass, IMO.

Despart does speak to the fact that LEOs knew kids were calling 911 but he uses the same sentence to move on to the rifle being able to penetrate body armor. And this to me moves past a huge point quickly, the idea that kids were known to be in immediate danger, and that whole line of failure and injustice and the resulting coverup of this wasn't really dealt with.

Then they speak to the pediatrician and he speaks of the size of the exit wounds, etc. It's powerful, I with the pediatrician was fear more on all media. He's an unassailable advocate and voice, IMO.

But at this point, editorially speaking they have moved away from responsibility for the systemic failures and on to the policy response, which IMO is another systemic failure that naturally follows the first, in a way. How can we get good policy without confronting the truth? But they say something similar when they discuss the Emmet Till open casket theory of having the public see the damage an AR-15 does. But of course they just talk about, they don't show it. The pediatrician says maybe the public needs to see what he saw. Maybe. Just not on PBS, and not today.

Because from there it's on to the legislative response, after a short bit where they show Hinjosa asking for an audience / interview with Greg Abbott and being turned down.

She speaks to Roland Gutierrez and the Raise the Age bills and that leads to the need to give republicans their "equal time" and we are only 23 minutes into the program.

The good part is they spend more time with Caityln Gonzales and go over the 1970's walkout from Robb. That' possibly the best part of the whole program. It concludes with the idea that in both 1970 and today, it's the children rising up that counts, that might make the difference. This get more than ten minutes. It's great and redeems the personal reasons I disked the choices they make. I can see why they went this way. I just wish they didn't.

Then we see Caitlyn's powerful speech wheres in tears, shaking, she tells the crowd on the capitol steps, "I should'nt be here, I'm only ten years old but my friends have no voice."

And the rest of the program follows the failed lege efforts of parents and Gutierrez, and the partisan fights over gun control vs "mental health" dodges that the GOP uses but won't fund. And how that leads to a failed end to the lege session for all the gun control bills.

It's powerful televison and a good program. But DPS McCraw gets a complete pass, and that's just how these editorial decisions have to get made when you only have 60 minutes to tell the story.

It's good on the science, the law, the policy and suffering and speaks directly to some in politics who prolong the suffering, to be sure but won't make a statement as to who is RESPONSIBLE for prolonging the suffering. It's PBS. They have to give airtime to the NRA's viewpoint or else risk defunding, frankly. The GOP will attack Sesame Street, too. Not just FRONTLINE or NPR. We live in perilous times and speaking truth to power is a touchy game when your voice depends on donations and government mandated air-time and broadcast width on the spectrum of "free" speech that always seems to need paying sponsors.

The program ends with the Raise the Age bill passing out of the conference committee but then dying. "It will be another two years before the families can try again." are the last words.

Powerful.