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Gunmen Kills 19 Children, 2 Adults in Texas School; Biden Calls for Gun Reform: 'Sick and Tired' of Mass Shootings. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired May 25, 2022 - 06:00   ET

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

[06:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. It is Wednesday, May 25. I'm John Berman live in Uvalde, Texas. Brianna Keilar is in New York this morning.

And behind me is the Robb Elementary school where 19 children and two adults are dead. Children, second, third, fourth graders ages 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years old.

At this moment, parents are giving DNA samples to try to match with their deceased children as they await for some kind of news about what happened.

This is what we know at this hour, all the new details we've been getting in overnight. As I said, 21 people have been killed, including a teacher.

Police say the gunman shot his grandmother, who is in critical condition, then crashed his vehicle before entering this elementary school wearing body armor.

The 18-year-old shooter has been identified. He attended the high school in this town. He was killed by law enforcement officers at the scene.

A photo of two AR-15-style rifles appeared on an Instagram account linked to the gunman just three days before the shooting. His TikTok page had a bio under his profile picture that said, "Kids be scared."

It was an emotional President Biden, just upon returning from a trip to Asia, who addressed the nation late last night, calling on the country to turn its collective pain into political action.

This is the deadliest shooting, obviously, in an elementary school since the Sandy Hook massacre one decade ago.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: A family member confirms to CNN that Eva Mireles, a fourth-grade teacher, was killed in this shooting. None of the victims' identities have, at this point, been released by police.

It was a nightmare for so many parents with children at Robb Elementary, many of them waiting helplessly into the night with no word about the fate of their sons and daughters. BERMAN: It is a nightmare, an ongoing nightmare for so many of these

families. And I'm joined now by Shimon Prokupecz here in Uvalde. And I just want to start with that really tough fact to digest which is that these family members are giving DNA samples to help match with the murdered children, Shimon.

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME & JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: That means that these injuries are pretty gruesome. These little bodies shot. Indications that perhaps they're having a hard time identifying them, so they need DNA from these families.

And just how difficult that must be for these family members. Many of them who went home after spending hours at the center here trying to get word of their kids, their grandkids. Parents, grandparents who came in from as far as San Antonio to try and find out what's going on with their grandkids and having to give this DNA sample, waiting for word on their loved ones.

So that just gives you some indication of just how gruesome it must have been inside this school.

And John, you know, I just got here a short time ago, like you, and I walked up and down this street. And I'm just struck by how flat this structure is and how it's just one floor and how easy it is for someone to get inside and really to go from classroom to classroom, as investigators said that he did go from one classroom to another, shooting at the kids.

So it's just so striking to see this school here --

BERMAN: It's just right in the neighborhood.

PROKUPECZ: Right in the neighborhood.

BERMAN: And there's no big perimeter here. You don't have to walk back to get to it. You can walk right up to one of the doors or one of the windows. It's just right here.

And I do want to apologize to our viewers, I mean, for some of the gruesome imagery we are evoking here, but I think it's necessary to understand exactly what happened; how horrific this is and how painful it is for this community.

Shimon, what are the latest details we're getting on the timeline here?

PROKUPECZ: So all right now that we know is that this unraveled sometime in the morning around 11 a.m. local time, between 11, 11:30, where investigators say he shoots his grandmother.

And then we don't know. Something happens where he winds up at this location, crashes into this ditch, gets out of the car. The police are here already, sort of indications of they're on his trail, perhaps. Something is going on where the police are able to get here pretty quickly, and they engage him.

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And then he gets inside the school. They say they tried to shoot him, take him out, but the problem was he was wearing some kind of body armor, so they couldn't --

BERMAN: We saw that in Buffalo, too.

PROKUPECZ: Right. So this may be a little different. You know, in Buffalo he was completely suited out in military gear for all intents and purposes. A little different here.

And somehow, he gets inside the school. And then obviously, they say they're waiting for more officers to respond, because they're trying to take him down. And eventually officers respond. He's barricaded inside somewhere in the school, and there's this gun fight. A lot of gunshots, a lot of firepower.

There's still a lot of questions, because we don't have the full timeline. What happens in between the time that he shoots his grandmother and the time that he gets here?

And also, John, quite frankly, we don't even know if this was the intended target. Did something happen? Was he heading somewhere else? Because he crashes. He goes in this ditch, and then he comes out of the car almost in a rush, and storms the school.

BERMAN: Do you know how long he was in the school?

PROKUPECZ: It seems like a long time. Remember, if you look at the tweets from the school, there are tweets sometime in the 11 a.m. hour, and then I think there's a tweet in the 12 p.m. hour. So it seems like a long time.

BERMAN: That's horrible to imagine how long he might have been in there and also the number of shots fired. We know 21 people killed, but many more injured.

PROKUPECZ: Correct. Many more injured. And he had a lot of firepower.

You know, there's that friend who spoke -- who CNN spoke to who said he saw a backpack, a photo of a backpack, of the gunman's backpack that was filled with -- with bullets.

He also says that he saw these weapons, and he asked him, What are you doing with it? And he sort of said, you know, Don't worry about it.

And the thing is, that friend, it doesn't appear, ever reported that to police.

Look, we are getting indications that there were concerns with his behavior, with the gunman's behavior. A friend tells CNN that he was bullied. There were a lot of concerns at home.

I was talking to law enforcement. There was a fight between him and the grandmother, and that is what perhaps set him off. Something triggered him. There is information or indications that something triggered him. What exactly that is, we still don't know.

They are not seeing any kind of radicalization like we saw in Buffalo. They are not seeing that with this particular shooter. So that's what's leading investigators to think this is more a situation where he was triggered by something.

BERMAN: We do see an 18-year-old who went out to buy two high-profile weapons.

PROKUPECZ: On his birthday, right? So he knew when he was able to buy it, at what age he was able to buy the weapons.

And I think that's part of the other thing that investigators are looking at, whether or not there was some planning that went into this. But I think in terms of the investigation, for viewers to understand, is that there is still a lot of questions that remain unanswered.

And I think also very important this community, there are people, there are homes all across, and this community is going to suffer in ways that are, you know -- are unimaginable. And more will come out today, certainly.

BERMAN: We're going to speak to someone who heard the shots being fired who lives in this neighborhood and could hear the shots being fired. Everyone here, I think, is affected by this. Some of the meet- up points, you know, are at the local stores.

Shimon Prokupecz, thank you. We'll let you get back to your reporting. Please let us know what else you learn -- Brianna.

KEILAR: With us now is CNN senior law enforcement analyst Andrew McCabe. He is the former deputy director at the FBI.

Andrew, maybe you can shed some light for us on what investigators are doing right now. But also, you heard Shimon's new reporting.

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Sure. What they're doing now this this investigation is the same thing that they've done after Buffalo, after the mass shooting before that, and after every one of these ones that we've, unfortunately, had to talk about together.

They are executing search warrants on the attacker's home. They are interviewing his parents, his family, his relatives, his friends. They are coursing through his social media to understand what sort of communications or statements or photographs he may have posted and put out to the world.

They're looking at every document, every notebook that might be in, you know, the room that he occupied, looking for things that he may have written or expressed to shed some light on why he embarked upon this awful attack and to also determine, quite frankly, if the school was the subject of the attack.

So with -- with respect to Shimon's comments, that's what really is the biggest question in my mind, Brianna, is we really don't know exactly where this -- this person was going and what he was trying to accomplish yesterday.

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Was the crash of the vehicle an intended or expected part of this attack? Was the school, in fact, his intended destination when he set out from his grandmother's house?

What led to his, you know -- his attack on his grandmother before he left the house? There's a lot of details that we really don't know.

And getting interviews from those law enforcement officers who saw him before the attack, around the crash of the vehicle, around his approach to the school, that's going to be of key importance to try to establish a timeline and understand how and why this happened.

BERMAN: Just to remind people, crashed the car, drove the car in a ditch, and then from that ditch went into this school behind me and then was in the school, according to Shimon's reporting, Andy, for some time. How does that strike you?

MCCABE: Yes, you know, the thing that's the strangest to me, John, is that there was -- we have heard now a few times since yesterday there were some indications that there was an interaction with law enforcement before he gets into the school or on his way up to the school.

So, yes, it's really puzzling to me how he gets out of the car, rushes to the school, interacts with law enforcement, goes inside, possibly in an effort to get away from the law enforcement rather than a premeditated attack. We don't know the answer to that quite yet, but that's really what we need to get to.

KEILAR: It seems there's always missed signs, right? And that's the case here. It's more egregious in some cases than others, but I wonder what stands out to you in this particular shooting, Andy.

MCCABE: Well, Brianna, you know, you're hearing a lot of those things that we've heard about mass shooters in the past, right? Hearing there's this record of bullying and maybe abuse by classmates or in school. Obviously, conflict within the family. We know that because he attacked his grandmother.

And then this clearly premeditated purchase of very devastatingly lethal weapons on his 18th birthday. So this is something that this attacker was thinking about for some extended period of time, had planned on doing at least the acquisition of the weapons on the day of his birthday.

Those guns aren't free. They're expensive. He had to somehow put together the money to make those purchases.

So I think it all indicates, potentially, a high degree of planning and anticipation of some sort of event or attack like this. And while that process is happening, you have to assume it's typically

the case that family members and friends saw warning signs that went unheeded. And I expect that as we get more information about this attacker, we'll see the same thing here.

KEILAR: It is formulaic. It always is. You hope that you learn lessons, and sometimes it seems like we just don't. Andrew, thank you so much for being with us.

So although police have not publicly identified any of the 21 victims in the Texas school shooting, the family of Eva Mireles is telling CNN that she was one of the two adults who was killed.

Mireles taught fourth grade at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, and she spent 17 years as an educator. When Eva wasn't teaching, we're told she enjoyed running, hiking, biking and spending time with her family. Later on NEW DAY, Eva Mireles' aunt is going to join us to talk about her beloved niece.

BERMAN: Our special live coverage of the mass shooting here in Uvalde, Texas, continues.

CNN was on board Air Force One the moment President Biden learned about the shooting. Our reporter's account.

And an impassioned plea on the Senate floor as Democrats try to move to tee up a vote on background checks.

Again, this is CNN's special live coverage.

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SEN. CHRIS MURPHY (D-CT): Why do you spend all this time running for the United States Senate? Why do you go through all the hassle of getting this job, of putting yourself in a position of authority, if your answer is that, as this slaughter increases, as our kids run for their lives, we do nothing.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: To lose a child is like having a piece of your soul ripped away. There's a hollowness in your chest. You feel like you're being sucked into it and never going to be able to get out, suffocating.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: That was an emotional President Biden not long after he returned to the United States from Asia. President Biden obviously knows the pain of losing a child, talking about the families of the victims of this mass shooting here behind me at the Robb Elementary School.

Again, he spoke moments just after stepping off of Air Force One, where he was briefed on the attack. CNN's M.J. Lee joins me now. She was on the plane when the president found out.

M.J., that must have been some flight.

M.J. LEE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John. The president finding out about this shooting, as you said, on his way back from a five-day trip to Asia.

And actually, John, the reporters that were traveling with the president on Air Force One, we didn't know what was going on because, as you know, we don't have access to Wi-Fi. And, actually, we found out when White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, she came back to the press cabin to tell us that she had an update to offer us.

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And that's when she read for us what she had tweeted just moments ago, that the president has been briefed on the horrific news of the elementary school shooting in Texas. And you just got that sinking feeling as soon as she said the words "elementary school." You knew that the next word was going to be "shooting."

She also, then, told us that the president, upon getting back to the White House, would be making a speech.

That's when we turned the TVs back on in the press cabin, and we saw those horrific CNN chyrons, showing that already many children were dead, an adult was dead.

And it was on this flight back on Air Force One that the president, of course, continued to be briefed by his advisers. He started working on that speech that he would deliver last night, and this was a speech where he, once again, called for action.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: Beautiful, innocent second-, third-, fourth-graders. And how many scores of little children who witnessed what happened, see their friends die as if they're in a battlefield, for God's sake.

As a nation, we have to ask when in God's name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby? When in God's name we do what we all know in our gut needs to be done?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEE: And, John, one of the things that the president said in this speech was that flying back from Asia, he was struck by the fact that this kind of mass shooting, it rarely happens in other countries, that this kind of thing is so distinctly American.

And I don't know if there's anything else that sort of helps illustrate that better than the fact that the president, just before leaving for Asia, he traveled to Buffalo, New York, to once again console and be with the community there, because there had been a mass shooting there at a supermarket.

So just something that he is having to do over and over again. And what we are told now is that the president is sort of channeling Sandy Hook, that he wants to sort of continue pushing Congress, that he doesn't think that he can stop pushing Congress.

But, again, Sandy Hook, that happened ten years ago. So that also captures just the immense lack of action on gun control here in Washington.

And John, I will tell you, I got here early this morning. The flag, of course, is flying at half-mast over the White House. This was something that the president announced last night.

Again, just one more time that across the country, we are mourning another mass shooting. And the casualty this time being so many children, as well as adults at this elementary school behind you, John.

BERMAN: M.J. Lee, I do appreciate you being with us this morning. I know it was a long night for you, a long night for the country, as well. Thanks, M.J. -- Brianna.

KEILAR: Joining us now, CNN political analyst and national politics reporter at "The New York Times," Astead Herndon; and national political correspondent at the "New York Times," Lisa Lerer.

Let's talk about this, because we listen to Joe Biden. It feels a little bit like it's on repeat. This happens all the time. And, of course, he feels as he is describing. But Lisa, what can he actually do and what does he think he can actually do?

LISA LERER, NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, "NEW YORK TIMES": Well, in reality, he's really limited, and it's clear he knows that.

I think Biden, in particular, has a very personal perspective on this. He has, of course, lost two children, so he knows what that grief is like.

But he's also been through the politics of guns several times over the past decade and beyond. He passed the original assault weapons ban in the '90s. He saw it fail to be renewed.

He was the point person on Obama's push after Sandy Hook. He saw that end in failure.

And I think it's really notable that he spoke very evocatively, but he didn't actually call for anything in these remarks. He didn't say, Congress, I want you to do 'X.' It was more an effort to sort of rally the American people. But it's really hard to see how anything actually gets passed and anything actually changes legislatively.

KEILAR: Where is Congress right now on doing anything? ASTEAD HERNDON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean, we know that Chuck

Schumer has tried to fast-track bringing back up those background checks bills.

But as Lisa is saying, those don't have full -- full Senate support. Those still need to overcome that Senate filibuster barrier that has continuously stymied the Biden administration turn after turn.

This is an issue that like many others that has public support for those background checks bills. But we have a disconnect between what's politically possible and what the public actually largely supports.

That's partly because the Senate is so outside -- is so -- such a of an outlier, partisan ideology-wise, from where the country is. And it's also because of a Democratic Party that isn't united on this issue themselves. Part of the folks who are -- who have been a challenge in passing this have been some Democrats. You have a united Republican Party against it.

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That has, again, been the Biden problem on a host of issues. Not only has there not been united Democratic support, but with Republicans united in opposition, it's really made several of these initiatives, and continuously guns, really, really hard to pass in the way that so frustrated Obama before him. And now we're seeing this with Biden.

KEILAR: You hear proponents of these gun measures. And they point out, Look, the vast majority of people, they want restrict -- they don't want these high-capacity magazines. They want restrictions on these AR-15-style weapons like this person used in this. They want background checks, right? These are very popular things.

But voters are not single-issue voters on this enough. And in the end, that kind of absolves lawmakers of actually pushing forward on this.

LERER: Well, there are voters who are single-issue voters on this. They're just all Republicans.

KEILAR: Well, that's a very good point.

LERER: Right. Supporters, there's a lot of -- you know, it's a question of political intensity. And the political intensity is on the side of Republicans.

Democratic voters, sure, many of them do care about gun control laws. Many, particularly those suburban women, who have become this crucial demographic, who really, frankly, elected Joe Biden to where he is now and elected a large part of this House and Senate majorities. They do care about this issue.

They also care about climate change. They also care about abortion. They also perhaps care about racial justice. They care about a whole suite of issues, whereas the Republican voters who care about this, many of them, this is first, second and third on their issue list. And they will just stay home if a Republican lawmaker isn't sticking with them on gun rights.

So the Republicans pay a higher price politically.

HERNDON: And it's obvious from the Republican statements in response to this. If we were going to see a moment of compromise here, if we were going to see kind of the parties come to a unique point of agreement, I think we would see some of those concessions starting from Republicans at this point.

Even in the intensity of this, of the grief post-shooting, another deadly mass shooting, something that obviously reaches kids in the way that Sandy Hook really reaches at the heart strings, they're not caving. They are not -- they are not giving an inch.

And that is because they feel like they have a party and a grassroots base that will back them on this issue, as Lisa said, kind of single- issue myopic voters, that giving -- that they see the kind of principle of gun ownership as a larger goal, frankly, than even the marginal benefits of what -- of what some gun control can be.

We're not even talking about -- I mean, let's be clear. We're not talking about the gun control measures that most liberals want or even -- or even could actually, you know, be kind of some sweeping -- we're talking, really at this point, about basics of background checks, and that still has the same type of political unlikelihood.

LERER: Right. We're less than 24 hours out from this horrible event, but right now, at least, there's no sign that any Republicans feel any different or unique pressure as a result of having children slain in their classrooms.

KEILAR: Lisa, Astead, thank you so much to both of you for that -- John.

BERMAN: All right. Moments ago, CNN -- CNN identified a 10-year-old victim in the Robb Elementary school shooting. What her father is revealing about her this morning.

This is CNN's special live coverage. Stay with us.

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