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Texas House Investigative Committee Releases Preliminary Report Of The Robb Elementary School Shootings; First Responders Failed At Saving Lives; Robb Elementary's Safety Policy Failures. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired July 17, 2022 - 17:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[17:00:00]

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RYAN NOBLES, CNN HOST: Hello, everyone. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Ryan Nobles in Washington in tonight for Jim Acosta. And we begin this hour with a torrent of new details about the botched law enforcement response to the Uvalde school shooting. Nineteen children and two teachers were killed in that massacre on May 24. The Texas house investigative committee's preliminary report released today lays out the, quote, "systemic failures and egregious poor decision making in the law enforcement response."

We are also expecting a conference from Uvalde at any moment now. We'll bring you that -- we'll bring it to you live, I should say, as soon as it starts. But we begin this hour with CNN's Rosa Flores. She has been reading through the report. Rosa, does the report cover why authorities waited more than an hour in a hallway before confronting and killing the gunman and did that delay cost lives?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, Ryan, in the report it does mention a few lines about why officers waited. It states that they were waiting for the keys. They were waiting for more equipment. But let me take you through it because there are very telling details that we did not know before reading this report.

According to this report, Chief Pete Arredondo actually wrote the active shooter policy. He wrote in himself as the incident commander but, according to this report, he didn't take on that role on that ill-fated day.

It says that he not only didn't take the role, he didn't transfer command of the scene to any other officer which, according to this report, could have been done in this case in this jurisdiction. Now, the report is much broader than this. It just does not just point the finger at Arredondo.

It also says that there were hundreds of police officers who responded to the scene and it points out that those trained police officers then did not question that command. They didn't question that there was no incident commander, that there was no incident command post when in the policy that Arredondo wrote it specifically states that he wrote in there that the administration office was going to be the incident command post, but of course, none of that happened. And hundreds of police officers responded to the scene and the training didn't kick in. That's what this report says, that it's a vast failure among various law enforcement agencies responding with hundreds of police officers responding and instead of actually acting on their training, what they did was sit and wait.

I want to read from the report because the report says, "At Robb Elementary, law enforcement responders failed to adhere to their active shooter training, and they failed to prioritize saving the lives of innocent victims over their safety."

Instead, according to this report, they waited. They waited for keys. They waited for more equipment. Keys that were not needed. Equipment that had arrived, according to this report, were the ballistic shields that they were waiting. The U.S. Marshalls, according to this report, provided a shield at 12:20.

Now we know, of course, that the team from Border Patrol that breached the door didn't breech the door until 12:50. This report specifically states that even that team that eventually went in also waited. They were also waiting for equipment which had arrived, according to this report, at 12:20.

It goes on to say that the training should have kicked in as soon as the gunman fired more gunshots. This report is very specific about this because the report says that Pete Arredondo, he came across as calling this a barricaded subject. That's what he said in his testimony.

But this report questions the training not only of Pete Arredondo but of all the officers that were there on that ill-fated day who knew better that once the gunman started firing shots, that training should have kicked in. They should have gone into that room to save those children and the teachers.

And this report specifically says that none of these officers, hundreds of them, seized that opportunity to then take charge or create an incident command post or do something other than sit and wait. I want to continue reading from the report because it says, quote, "In particular, the locking mechanism to room 111 was widely known to be faulty, yet it was not repaired. Robb Elementary had a culture of noncompliance with safety policies requiring doors to be kept locked which turned out to be fatal."

[17:04:52]

This report goes on to say, "because of these failures of facilities maintenance and advance preparation, the attacker fired most of his shots and likely murdered most of his innocent victims before any responder set foot in that building. Of the approximately 142 rounds the attacker fired inside that building, it is almost certain that he rapidly fired over 100 of those rounds before any officer entered."

Now, we know, of course, that 19 students and two teachers lost their lives on that ill-fated day. A lot more details, Ryan, in this report. But those are some of the highlights. Now, we've learned that a lot of the public, and you can probably see some people walking in behind me, is coming to the civic center here in Uvalde right now because we're expecting a press conference where officials from the Texas house investigative committee are expected to answer questions from the press and also from individuals from this community. So, we're going to be monitoring that as this develops. Ryan?

NOBLES: Rosa Flores, just incredible reporting, as always, as we learn more about the contents of this report. We knew it was going to be shocking. It's actually even more shocking than we expected. Rosa, stick with us. We'll get back to you in a moment. And as we await this press conference out of Uvalde, let's talk a little bit about what we've learned from this report, digest some of it and break it down.

Joining us now former Boston police commissioner Ed Davis and CNN national security analyst Juliette Kayyem. Juliette, let's start with you. So, based on this report, and you heard Rosa outline it, and I -- this was the one thing that stuck out with me more than anything, it seems like every level of the response, from local up to federal had major failures. And how do you explain that?

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes. In some ways you can't although I thought this was the best report so far or the most honest to try to describe it. You can't excuse it at this stage. So, I need to begin with the obvious, which is an 18-year-old walks no a school and kills 19 children with a military style weapon.

And I say that not simply because of that issue, but because the thing that he deprives us of is time. There's no time, right? So, you have to respond very quickly. And what becomes clear from the report is that after three minutes, when law enforcement arrives and the failure to set up an incident command system or even a physical incident command post creates so much chaos and confusion including, as Rosa was saying, the belief that this was a barricade situation rather than an active shooter one.

That original, sort of failure of process, failure of architecture -- I have no better way to say it -- is never overcome. And so, you see the information doesn't get around. The communications don't get around. Rosa described how in the report they thought they were waiting for some equipment. The equipment was already there. All of that is cured by a system called the incident command system that all of these guys were trained in. So, that's the first piece.

The second, just very quickly, is now with that process failure, that architecture failure, hundreds of police officers do not challenge it. That is also inexplicable because if the system is not working, someone should have come forward and said this whole system is broken. By design, we have to go in there. And so, you have this failure upon failure, but the original sort of omission of creating a system that everyone understood meant that that's the chaos and the lack of sort of immediacy that we see in those pictures, just this sort of randomness of these guys standing around.

NOBLES: And the report outlines how there were so many different officers from so many different agencies from so many different levels. And this was supposed to be a problem that was solved, the communication between all of them.

After 9/11, there was an overhaul of systems like these where agencies were supposed to be able to have an easy way to talk to each other in a situation like this. There were 376 responders, over 20 agencies just in this particular situation and it was still a massive failure. Is part of the problem here is that there were too many people from too many different agencies dealing with this, Juliette?

KAYYEM: Yes, I think so. I think one of the takeaways here that I would take away from it is you have a very small police department, a school district, incredibly small school district, with six or eight members of it, that are expected to be the local incident commander. Overlay them with a local police department then a state and then, of course, all the Feds, the Border Police, and others that come.

So, one of the things that, as we look at recommendations because this report does not have recommendations, that we should think about is for these smaller jurisdictions.

[17:09:55]

Can we really depend on very small police departments that are heavily armed but probably lightly trained, with probably lacking some professionalism that you may want in larger police departments, though they have their problems, really being the first in charge.

And the other reason why is what you see in the report is because the culture of first responders and police is locals first. You never see the state or the Feds overcome that original local failure, right. So, they're just standing there knowing essentially that this is not a barricade situation, but they're not -- they're sort of ingrained in not overwhelming the local response.

NOBLES: Alright, Commissioner, let's get to you now. I mean, we can state the obvious here. You can put the most stringent security measures in place and that perfect police training, but there really is a limit to what you can do in the face of laws that makes it so easy for someone to buy and an assault-style rifle in a country that has more guns than people, right?

I mean, is the most obvious problem here that an 18-year-old with a history of mental health problems and a difficult family situation was able to get a gun and that level of ammunition so easily?

ED DAVIS, FORMER BOSTON POLICE COMMISSIONER: That certainly is the core of this issue, Ryan. You know, there's no question that these are weapons of war. There's no effective cover in an urban environment to hide from these bullets. They'll go through brick walls. They'll go through cars. It is a devastating weapon. It's in the hands of an 18- year-old, an 18-year-old that was having some prior psychological issues.

When you combine those two things together, it's a deadly combination, and we need to get our hands wrapped around this. There's no reason to have these massive amounts of ammunition that are readily available. There's no reason to have 30 round clip magazines in these weapons. Those are designed to kill people on the battlefield.

And that's tragically what the school has turned into. I agree with what Juliette had to say. The smaller police departments may not have the ability to handle a situation like this. But the failures were so incredible here. It's antithetical to everything I know about policing in my 35 years of experience. I've responded to these types of situations. You usually have to hold people back from going in.

NOBLES: Right.

DAVIS: I do not understand how this could have happened.

NOBLES: Yes. Alright, everyone stay with me. As you can see, we're monitoring this press conference in Uvalde, Texas. The second it begins, we will break in and bring it to you. We'll break down everything they say after the fact with our team of experts plus we'll more on this report detailing failures in the response to the school shooting there in May. We'll bring all of this to you as soon as it happens. Stay with us.

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[17:15:00]

NOBLES: And we are still awaiting a press conference out of Uvalde, Texas, tonight after a preliminary report found, quote, "systemic failures and egregious poor decision making in the law enforcement response of the school shooting in May where 19 kids and two teachers were killed."

Back with me to talk more about this, the former Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis and CNN national security analyst Juliette Kayyem. Commissioner, you know, this isn't our first experience with a school shooting. Obviously, this is one of the worst ever, but more than two decades ago, Columbine changed how police handle mass shootings, The responses have gotten better but the shooters have also gotten more dangerous. Isn't that right?

DAVIS: There's no question. The amount of rounds that are being fired, the hardware that they have, they frequently are using body armor, bulletproof vests and things like that. They're thinking through this. They are -- as we saw in Buffalo, they're scouting out the locations beforehand.

So, they're doing things that make them much more effective and much more difficult to thwart because of it. So, we have to be aware of this. Learning is an integrative process. Every time one of these incidents happens, agencies like the Secret Service come in and do an extensive review of what happened. And that information is sent out.

And if we're doing our jobs properly, we're paying attention to that and it should inform our strategies on the police side. But you know, it should also inform target hardening on the school side. And I think that that old saying that customs eats policy for breakfast is exactly correct. If the custom is lax and it sounds like that's what happened here,

then anything you put in place is not going to work well. And that vigilance is really something we need to address as well.

NOBLES: But Commissioner, at what point do we run the risk of turning these schools into de facto prisons where children don't -- aren't in an environment -- the point is to make them feel safe, but if there's only one way for them to get in and out and where they have to be screened before they come in, it just seems sad that that is the type of learning environment that we need to create for our kids in order to keep them safe.

DAVIS: We do this work every day and I'm telling you right now, it doesn't require that. We don't have to turn these places into prisons. But little things like locks that function, alarms that are tested monthly, systems that are in place and strategies that are utilized to test those systems are really what's needed.

And if you have a culture where it gets warm or somebody wants to go back and forth to their car without going through the proper entrance, those are the things that defeat everything that we plan to do and all the millions of dollars that are spent at -- on target hardening.

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We're not talking about metal detectors in every school and security people inside, but gates that stop people from jumping over them, fences that are high enough. A lock that works. Those are the simple things that could have made a difference here.

NOBLES: Yes. Juliette, we've already touched on this a little bit, but let's talk about it a little more because according to the report, the shooter had what they described as an unstable home life. It included a mother struggling with substance abuse. He had no father figure. The shooter's family often moved. They lived in relative poverty.

I mean, it does seem like poverty is an underlying issue in mass shootings at elementary schools. You know, why aren't we talking more about how poverty could be a root cause of all of this?

KAYYEM: It's not -- it's often not -- it's not poverty. It's sometimes poverty I think is a reflection of something else which in these instances is, of course, isolated men, not boys, they're all over 18. We call them men, who are making decisions that they ought not to be making.

And so, poverty may be part of it but most of it is either a dysfunctional family or as we've seen, families that sometimes appease it as we are likely to find out from the July 4th shooting, but that's not always true. Looking back at school shootings, the Columbine, two killers who committed suicide were from very well-off families and actually the narrative about them is that we once thought that they were goth. They weren't. They were sort of well-integrated.

So, it's hard to say what the common theme is except for this. We do know that the data shows, it won't get everyone, that 18 to 20-year- old men ought not to be allowed to buy these weapons. Now, in my ideal world, no one would be allowed to buy these weapons, but I'm a realistic person.

We did not get that passed on the federal side, but if you look at the data that -- you know, I'm not a psychologist -- but the data does shows that the brain functioning, right, is that men of that age, 18 to 21 or 18 to 25 should not have access. They are buying it close to their 18-year-old birthdays. They are going into schools doing these mass shootings or going to places doing these mass shootings.

So, we didn't get that in this first round of federal legislation. It's something that should continue to be pushed because that is just where the data is in the absence of getting a ban on all of these guns. And the reason why that, what Ed was saying, what the commissioner was saying, was whatever barrier you put up is helpful, I mean, because once that guy starts shooting, I mean, you're done.

And I think that's why the report was sort of, I mean, the report has interesting language. It says we cannot prove that anyone died because of the delay. Why is that? Because of the autopsy reports. I am not shy about this. What those bullets did to those children, one bullet, two bullets, there's no bleeding out. I mean, honestly, there's no bleeding out.

And I think that's why the report was like, this is horrible to have seen, but we can't prove anything because we looked at these children's bodies and there's nothing left. And I think that's what the families are basically struggling with, that, you know, three minutes, five minutes, an hour, whatever it is, once he's in the room, there's no surviving. And that's, you know, that's a decision we've made, unfortunately, as a society.

NOBLES: Yes. I mean, there's a lot of public policy that we've restricted a number of things to people that are 21 and above.

KAYYEM: Yes.

NOBLES: I mean, there's precedent that we've set for this already. It should at least --

KAYYEM: Tell my teenaged boys that, right? I mean, you know, this is ridiculous, right. You know, they're 18 but not 21.

NOBLES: It should at least be a part of the discussion. Alright, we're going to try and sneak in one more break before we see the officials come to the table to have this press conference related to this report in Uvalde, Texas. We're standing by. We're going to bring it to you as soon as it happens. Stay with us. You're watching CNN.

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[17:25:00]

NOBLES: And as you can see, we are still awaiting a press conference out of Uvalde, Texas after a preliminary report found, quote, "systemic failures and egregious poor decision making in the law enforcement response of the school shooting in may where 19 kids and 2 teachers were killed."

Let's go back now to CNN's Rosa Flores. She is in Uvalde, Texas. And Rosa, as we wait to hear what the officials have to say in this press conference, what more can you tell us about the school's actions on the day of the shooting?

FLORES: You know, this report goes into some of the history, Ryan. It speaks of the wave of practices by the school that were unsafe, is the way that this report characterizes it. It says that the school administrators were not taking some of these issues seriously, and it actually speaks about room 111.

That's the room where Arnulfo Reyes, the teacher who survived, who gave his account of how he survived, how he saw the gunman in his room, and so many of those gut-wrenching final moments for a lot of his students.

He speaks about how the lock to his room was faulty and that officials knew about it. This report says that the school district police had specifically warned him that the lock was faulty, but this report says that nothing was done about it. That was one of many other issues that this report points to.

[17:30:03]

On that ill-fated day, it specifically states, too, that there were issues with the internet service, with cell service. And so, the messages that the school was trying to deliver were not getting to the right people.

It also specifically says that a P.E. coach, Yvette Silva, actually saw the gunman throw his backpack over the fence and get onto the property, that she immediately grabbed her radio and started communicating that information. And then she was frustrated because she didn't hear that the alert went out.

Again, part of the inaction on that day that triggered this catastrophic failed response by everyone on scene according to this report. First responders not just from the school, but from local police here in Uvalde, to county, to state officials, to even federal law enforcement officers.

Ryan, this report is very damning for everyone across the board. There were just so many systemic failures and collapse of command on that ill-fated day. This report goes into a lot of details, and I'm sure were very difficult for the families of the victims to read. Ryan?

NOBLES: Yes, and of course, it raises a lot more questions as well, Rosa. Questions that we hope to get at least answered on some level when this press conference begins, not just members of the media that we're told will be able to ask questions, but members of the community as well.

As soon as that begins, we're going to take it to you -- give it to you live. Rosa flores, thank you for that report. We'll stand by for this press conference. When it begins, we'll break into coverage to bring it to you when we take a quick break though and be right back. You're watching CNN.

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[17:35:00]

NOBLES: And we are still awaiting a press conference out of Uvalde, Texas, and back with us to prepare for what we expect to see here in the next few minutes, CNN national security analyst Juliette Kayyem and former Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis.

You know, Commissioner, one of the things that we did not get out of this report are any recommendations. From your perspective, what do you think needs to happen next for accountability and to prevent something like this from happening in the future?

DAVIS: Well, there have to be systemic changes to the way we respond to these things. I think you're going to see a real drilling down into the system as it stands now looking at the failures that occurred and doing everything possible to try to prevent that from happening. I can't say exactly what that's going to be, but it's going to be around the National Incident Management System, the command system that falls under that.

There's going to be new training coming out of it. And this is an important report because it's the first one. But I will tell you that we're waiting to see the police response to it, the committee that was put together by the Justice Department that has people who have expertise across this field to really drill down into exactly what happened and to get the technical issues enumerated so that they can be addressed in a response.

You know, this is similar to the FAA going to a plane crash. They have experts. They know what they're doing. It takes them a year to understand the whole thing. I think you're going to see a similar process occur with the experts on the police side.

NOBLES: Juliette, I want to ask you about another part of the report that we just learned today. They say the gunman's family members uniformly refused to buy guns for him, and that some of the shooter's social media contacts received messages from the shooter about guns, suggesting that he was going to do something that they would be hearing about in the news.

So, the report suggests that some of these social media users may have even reported the threatening behavior to social media platforms and it appears that nothing happened despite that.

KAYYEM: Right.

NOBLES: What could be done to prevent or, you know, use the power of social media to prevent this from happening again?

KAYYEM: Right. I mean, it's so true that we often hear, you know, after an incident like this, like people need to come forward, people need to say something, and then you often learn that there were people trying to say something. And so, instead of, you know, a lot of times there are those people, but law enforcement has to get better upon hearing from family members or community members about someone to respond.

That's why we have laws, red flag laws and others so that the police, they need to be better utilized, can come forward and sort of acknowledge that there might be a concern raised by a family member. The social media platforms are honestly useless. Like, I'm sort of done to totally hoping that --

(TECHNICAL DIFFICULTY)

Legal changes we may see the social media platforms is because, you know, we've been waiting 20 years for them to figure out why they're not capturing this stuff when they can, you know, capture some copyright infringement in two seconds. So, it's not (inaudible) to me. The reason why, of course, is the algorithm, you know, I say that nontechnically, is the engagement is what they like.

So, the crazier someone is, the more insane someone is, they get a lot of engagement. Well, that actually feeds the sort of commercial part of social media.

[17:40:02]

And so, I think that's -- these are things that we can continue to learn and continue to press, but I will always end with you, Ryan, as I always do, which is and because once that guy is in a room with that weapon it's over. It's over.

NOBLES: Yes.

KAYYEM: I mean, any defense that you want, any training that you want, anything, it is over. And so, we can put up all of these layered defenses beforehand because you basically have no response capabilities at the station.

I compare that, for example, to Columbine where you had, you know, you had the ability of people to escape. Those kids could never escape, those babies, essentially, could never escape that room.

NOBLES: Yes. So, Commissioner, talk to me a little bit about from a law enforcement perspective if you'd had those warning signs. If someone had informed you as a law enforcement professional about the concerns people had about an individual --

(TECHNICAL DIFFICULTY)

Starting in Uvalde, Texas. This is in response to the legislative report on the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting. We're going to listen in. We'll talk about it afterwards.

(BEGIN LIVE VIDEO)

UNKNOWN: Okay. The House committee on Uvalde elementary shooting will now come to order. Clerk, call the roll.

UNKNOWN: Representative Burrows?

DUSTIN BURROWS, STATE REPRESENTIVE OF TEXAS: Here.

UNKNOWN: Representative Moody?

JOE MOODY, STATE REPRESENTATIVE OF TEXAS: Present.

UNKNOWN: Justice Guzman.

EVA GUZMAN, FORMER TEXA SUPREME COURT JUSTICE: Here.

UNKNOWN: A quorum is present.

BURROWS: Okay. Quorum is present. First, let me say this. If you're going to ask a question today and you were not able to fill out a witness affirmation form, a WAF, you can still ask your question. Just send an e-mail to Paige (ph) and she'll get it to you and that should not be a reason you cannot answer.

What I would like to do today is start with this. If there's only one thing that I can tell you is there were multiple systemic failures. I would invite everybody to read the entire report. You cannot cherry pick one sentence and use it to say everything without reading it all together and with context.

But if we need a simple phrase to describe what the report says, again, I would tell you multiple systemic failures. I want to first thank the mayor of Uvalde for having -- hosting a meeting today with several of the families and asking for us to come by and attend, and I thought that was the respectful thing to do.

I thought it was respectful to at least let them hear from me before we open this up to a broader public discussion. I look forward to the questions here at the press conference. One of the things that I said in there to the families is we want to show them as much respect as possible. The entire time this committee has been together, we have wanted to show them the much respect possible, and we've tried to do that.

And I asked them if there was something we've ever done not respectful, to let us know what it is. But I told them the most we can do to be respectful at this point is not just to blame one person or one thing. And I hope the report, when people read all of it together, they understand that we look and take a broad approach to what happened that day.

My biggest fear, and I also shared this with them at the meeting, is that we will look for simple solutions to these complex answers. And we will all look and say, well, you know, that's the way it was in Uvalde. It's different here. Well, let me tell you, the people of Uvalde before this, they felt it couldn't happen here. They felt that.

That's the false sense of security I worry about. I think some of the same systems that we found here that failed that day are across the entire state and country. And I do not want to say because of one thing or one person here, it could not happen elsewhere. I think that's a disservice and not the respectful thing to do.

This committee was created by Speaker Dade Phelan and I'm so appreciative that he did this. He formed this committee just 44 days ago and I believe this committee has driven things to the forefront. I believe that because of this committee's work, some of the records have already been changed, and hopefully with this report a lot of the record is set straight.

This committee is a fact-finding committee. Our job was essentially to figure out what the facts were and report it.

[17:44:57]

It's a bipartisan -- the reason it's bipartisan is because the problems are not Republican problems. They're not Democrat problems. They're all of our problems. So, I'm very proud the speaker made this a bipartisan committee.

There are other committees in the Texas House and Texas Senate that will look at this report, look at the facts that we found here, and discuss and debate the policy that needs to be changed to try to make Texas children safer going forward in the future.

I'm a policymaker. My colleagues up here are policymakers or have strong opinions about changes to policy that need to be done. Today is not the day that we're going to share what our strong feelings and convictions are about that. That was not the task of finding the facts.

After some period of time, we will put our policymaker hats back on and share those opinions with the committee and others about what we think needs to change and what's done, but right now we're going to let the report speak for itself and focus on the facts that were found in there.

The committee met with more than 35 witnesses. Those were done in an executive session. That is the precedent of the House in the past and will likely be the precedent of the House going forward. Being in an executive session meaning the people and witnesses who attended did not have the cameras on them and did not testify for the public at- large to hear.

We believe that that probably allowed us to get their testimony quicker and also, they were more candid and more conversational allowing us to do our job more accurately. Other committees in the state of Texas do have subpoena power and will have the opportunity to subpoena those witnesses for you all to hear what they have to say for themselves. But that is the precedent of the House for an investigative committee to do this in executive session, which is what we did.

In addition to the 35 witnesses that we interviewed, there were 39 independent interviews that our investigators, who did a phenomenal job held to help us. We reviewed crime scene photos, audio and video from the incident, 911 calls. All of that went into trying to get this report compiled in 44 days so that we could deliver this here to Uvalde and hopefully you will find this reflective of the facts that we basically get to.

Let me tell you a little bit about the report. We talk about the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District, and let me say this. With hindsight, we can say the Robb Elementary was not adequately prepared for the risk of a school shooter. The school's 5-foot fence was inadequate. Despite a policy of locked doors, there was a regrettable culture of noncompliance.

In fact, all three exterior doors to the building were unlocked that day and multiple interior doors were not secured the day of the shooting. When I talked about the false sense of security, I do not believe that Uvalde Consolidated or Robb Elementary is the only school with these issues in it. I've talked to enough other educators around the state to believe this is a wider problem that we need to continue to look at.

We discussed the attacker. You will first notice we did not use his name. When we wanted to release the hallway video to the members of the families and the public, we were not going to show his image. He wanted that and he did not deserve it. He did not deserve to be -- have that recognition of his face or his name shown because it's what he wanted.

Also, there are cultures online who look and believe that when they see these videos there's something to be inspired by. We did not want others to look at these videos and to watch and be inspired by it. We only wanted to show the law enforcement response.

However, we did give you a more comprehensive look at the background of the attacker. We refer to him that throughout the report because that's how he refers to by the alert training. He fits the profile of many. He came from a broken home with little to no interaction with his father. He struggled in school both academically and socially.

He struggled to fit in and eventually became isolated. He networked through his peers, with his peers through social media and violent video games. It ultimately had a fixation on school shootings and even developed the nickname school shooter.

We also talk in this report about the failures of law enforcement. There's really two categories to think about when we talk about this. There is an early decision to treat this as an active shooter versus a barricaded subject situation.

[17:49:57]

If you know, and the training and standards we set for officers is if you know there is active shooting, active killing going on or somebody is dying, the standard is you have to continue to do something to stop that killing or stop that dying. That day, several officers in the hallway or in that building knew or should have known there was dying in that classroom.

And they should've done more acted with urgency. Try the door handles, try to go in through the windows. Try to distract him. Try to do something to address the situation. In fairness, there were many officers at that scene who were either denied access to the building or told misinformation.

Some were even told false information. Some were told that the police chief of the Consolidated Independent School District was actually inside the room actively negotiating with the shooter. Such that they did not know what was happening, they did not have the opportunity to do that. But that's not where the analysis stops.

Everyone who came on the scene talked about this being chaotic. The training suggests that chaos should not happen. Inside the school, there should be a tactical commander, someone who's taking lead on dealing with, be actually in the hallway. But there should also be an overall commander.

Somebody who's in overall command, flowing the information, making sure everybody knows what is going on. The fact that there was no overall commander outside the building where there should've been one, should've been known by many.

At a minimum, there was multiple opportunities depending on the relative training and experience of law enforcement officers to at least ask more questions or offer their guidance to try to remedy the chaotic situation and make sure there was effective overall command.

There was a lack of effective overall command that day. I am going to recognize my colleagues for some brief statements. And then we will answer the questions here today. Representative Moody?

MOODY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm Joe Moody, a Democrat from El Paso. I'm a former prosecutor. I worked on issues like criminal law and mental health for my entire legislative career. And, most importantly, I'm a father of three.

And, sadly, I've dealt with mass shootings before. In just two weeks, it'll be the third anniversary of the day a young man with a rifle murdered 23 people in El Paso. After that, we all kept asking why. Why did this happen to us? We're here today to provide some of those answers in Uvalde.

And while this information will never make up for the unspeakable loss this community has endured, El Pasoans know how important it is to know. I also know the report we've given points to something very complex. It's hard to hear that there were multiple systemic failures because we want to tell ourselves that systems work.

We want to tell ourselves there's one person we could point our fingers at. We want to tell ourselves that this won't happen again. That's just not true. What happened here is complicated. But there's also a call to action in this report because systems are something that we can and must improve.

I see the report as a baseline of information that we can all work from. So often these days politics starts with the answer and doesn't even care about the facts. Here, we're starting with the facts, the most thorough reliable report that's been done on what happened at Robb Elementary. There is more to do, but this report is a shared platform for us to work from together. The shootings in Uvalde and El Paso have important differences. So did

Midland, Odesa and Sutherland Springs and Santa Fe and on and on. But they also have important similarities that we can understand and address as a state. Although today isn't the day for that discussion, that's what this report can and must lead to.

I made a promise to the people of El Paso that I haven't forgotten and that I will never forget, to do everything in my power to make sure the legislature understands what happened --

(TECHNICAL DIFFICULTY)

[17:55:00]

GUZMAN: -- firsthand what took place and in pursuit of the truth. I did so, we did so at the request of Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan who charged us with delivering answers to the families who lost their loved ones and who seek to understand what happened that day. How could there be so many multiple systemic failures.

As our state and our country mourn the tragic deaths at Robb Elementary, our committee unpacked the evidence to discover and report the facts. As a former judge, I spent much of my professional life ensuring that the facts I relied on to make decisions were accurate. I brought to this process that same determination. After all, accurate facts have to provide the backdrop for any policy changes that will come out of this.

Throughout the investigative process, our only agenda was to follow the facts and the evidence. As John Adams famously said, whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of the facts and the evidence. That's where we placed our focus.

There we found the truth about what really happened at Robb Elementary that day. But we also found the reality of the breakdowns in procedures and protocols and processes, of the breakdowns and failures in judgment and decision making that occurred before and during the tragedy. That truth, it's heavy and it's hard because it lays bare human failures and it makes us confront collapses in our systems.

They were supposed to work, they were supposed to protect the innocents who now lie in their graves. Today we stand before a community that's still gripped in grief. With this report, families who are crushed by sorrow and pain, will now have desperately needed and deserved answers. But no report can heal the broken hearts. Only God can do that.

Knowing the truth, we hope will equip Texas lawmakers and leaders with information and knowledge that will guide them in deciding next steps. We hope the truth about this tragedy will also give this community the resolve to forge a path forward. I come here with humility and respect, and I am here for you, for the people of Uvalde.

BURROWS: Thank you. Pursuant to the House rules before a question is asked, we will have to have a Witness Affirmation Form. I said you can e-mail the committee clerk. Are we ready for questions at this time, Matt (ph)?

UNKNOWN: (Inaudible). When you ask your question, could you tell us your name and what news affiliate you represent? So, with that, we'll start with the media with questions.

UNKNOWN: Mr. Chairman, you had mentioned that no community --

UNKNOWN: Could you state your name and your affiliation? Thanks.

UNKNOWN: (Inaudible). You had mentioned that several communities cannot take any comfort in the fact that (inaudible) regard for somebody in charge who (inaudible) clearly frustrated, clearly scared (inaudible).

BURROW: What I am telling you is we have substantive committees that have already been formed. The governor formed those early on and the Speaker of the House formed it at the same time, 44 days ago. This has been done. They've already been working on this.

[17:59:59]

We now have some baseline information we can report to the legislature, help them basically make some decisions about systemic failures.