Prez visits mourners after mass killings
President Trump was met by both supporters and protesters Wednesday in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas, as he sought to serve as healer-in-chief for two communities in mourning after the latest fatal mass shootings.
Trump visited hospitals and spoke with local leaders in both cities. But even as the president sought to lend a calming presence to those who were grieving, he launched broadsides at Democratic officials and 2020 rivals who decried him for sowing division and for not doing enough on gun control.
Leaving the White House Wednesday, Trump disputed claims that his rhetoric has contributed to the violence, saying he “brings people together.” But critics say an anti-immigration screed authorities linked to the shooter that gunned down 22 people in an El Paso Walmart Saturday mimicked Trump’s language of an “invasion” in Texas.
In his first stop, Trump thanked first responders and hospital staff, and met with victims of the Dayton shooting and their families. Trump later visited with survivors of the El Paso shooting. He praised first responders and hospital staff in both cities, saying they “have done an incredible job.”
Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley told reporters, “I think the victims and the first responders were grateful that the president of the United States came.”
But Whaley and Ohio U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown said they urged Trump to push for stricter gun laws in the Republican-controlled Senate.
“We can’t get anything done in the Senate because Mitch McConnell and the president of the United States are in bed with the gun lobby,” Brown said.
Whaley said, “Do I think we’re going to see another mass shooting tomorrow or Friday? Probably, because Washington will not move.”
Trump, on Twitter, later accused the pair of “misrepresenting what took place inside the hospital.” He told reporters the two “shouldn’t be politicking today.”
Democratic presidential hopefuls Joe Biden and Cory Booker also took aim Wednesday at Trump.
“This president has fanned the flames of white supremacy in this nation. His low-energy, vacanteyed mouthing of words written for him condemning white supremacists this week fooled no one,” Biden said from prepared remarks in Iowa. He said Trump’s rhetoric is “fueling a literal carnage.”
Trump tweeted, “Watching Sleepy Joe Biden making a speech. Sooo Boring! The LameStream Media will die in the ratings and clicks with this guy. It will be over for them, not to mention the fact that our Country will do poorly with him.”
At Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C., where nine black parishioners were killed by a white supremacist in 2015, Booker spoke of “the highest office in our land where we see in tweets and rhetoric hateful words that ultimately endanger the lives of people in our country, people of color, immigrants.”
Beto O’Rourke, who represented El Paso in Congress and paused his presidential campaign to return there after the shooting, told Trump not to visit. Trump tweeted O’Rourke “should respect the victims & law enforcement – & be quiet.” O’Rourke fired back, “22 people in my hometown are dead after an act of terror inspired by your racism. El Paso will not be quiet and neither will I.”