commenting publicly, exclusively to cnn. he was called out as the commander responsible for the delayed response at robb elementary last tuesday. the tactical teams took more than 45 minutes to enter the classroom where a gunman had locked himself in that room with children he had just shot and students who were calling 911 pleading for help. so the texas department of public safety says arredondo has not responded to its request for a follow-up interview with the texas rangers who were investigating this shooting. but just last night away from public view, from any media coverage arredondo was privately sworn in and onto the uvalde city council as a councilman. cnn s shimon prokupecz is in uvalde with this. what did the chief tell you? reporter: he insists that he s cooperating, that he s calling the dps, the state investigators. they obviously say he hasn t been returning their calls, but the key question here, the key question over what his decision-making was, what
where they met with the families of the 19 children and two teachers in the school shooting which came ten days after buffalo. as biden left a church service in uvalde, he was met by a crowd of people chanting do something. he responding by telling the crowd, we will. the president sounded a similar note in the commencement speech at the university of delaware, telling graduates that the country can and must do something. let s be clear. evil came to that elementary school in texas, to that grocery store in new york, far too many places where innocents have died. the face of such forces, we have to stand stronger. we must stand stronger, we cannot outlaw, tragedy, i know, but we can make america safer. but let s be honest, optimism is in short supply on whether congress will do anything at all, even as protests raged throughout the weekend outside the nra conference that took place in houston, inside the event donald trump himself and other republican political leaders
elementary school, could have, should have been confronted sooner. parents demanding answers. why? why were police reluctant to immediately engage with the gunman? one explanation the texas department of public safety initially gave to cnn is that the officers could have been shot or killed, but we now know the mind-set goes directly against texas protocol for school shooter situations, which uvalde police trained for just two months ago. the manual states as first responders, we must recognize that innocent life must be defended. a first responder unwilling to place the lives of the innocent above their own safety should consider another career field. armed officers circled the building and up to 19 of them were inside a school hallway just feet away, kids and teachers in two classrooms were utterly helpless against the gunman. young kids, some covered in the blood of their friends dialed 911 begging for help. nearly 80 minutes after the gunman first entered the building he
trial between johnny depp and his ex-wife amber heard. the vicious accusations during closing arguments. the case now in the hands of the jury. announcer: this is nbc nightly news with lester holt. good evening. i m tom llamas in for lester tonight it was a gutting admission today from texas law enforcement that a decision was made not to enter the classroom where the gunman was with an entire fourth grade class for almost an hour police admitting today that was a mistake we also learned for much of that hour there were 19 police officers outside the door who did not go in we have shown you the video of frantic parents outside the school pleading with officers to go in. today we learned that there were children inside the school calling 911. one of them begging, please, send the police now still they did not go in 19 children and 2 teachers were killed when asked how many lives could have been saved if they acted earlier the official could only say i don t know new imag
she had three children. i have to stop you there, in terms of school shootings it hasn t worked. there are school resource officers. there have been at very high profile school shootings. there was one in uvalde who just wasn t on campus. there was one in parkland who was on campus. there were two hold on. there were two in columbine. buffalo had an armed security officer. the point is congresswoman hold on congresswoman, let me just ask the question and then you can answer. hold on, congresswoman. the point is they can t protect every single entrance and exit. they just can t. they ve tried. well, i think, one, if you had had one exit, which you had one entrance, multiple exits, but one entrance in that school, we don t know whether or not that would have worked. it has worked at other schools. there was not a student a school resource officer at that school, and that was a problem. there was not one there to confront the gunman when they came in. those protocols need to be