What A Day - The Police Response To The Uvalde Shooting

Episode Date: May 27, 2022

Parents and other community members in Uvalde, Texas, are criticizing local police for its handling of the Robb Elementary School shooting where 21 people were killed on Tuesday. In addition, many are wondering why there were differences in the initial statements that officials had made, why it took so long for police to apprehend the gunman, and how the gunman was apparently able to enter the school through an unlocked door.In headlines: Oklahoma enacted the country’s strictest anti-abortion law, actor Kevin Spacey was charged with four counts of sexual assault in the U.K., and a New York court required Trump and his family members to sit for a deposition in a civil case brought by Attorney General Letitia James.And we interview Makanalani Gomes, a member of the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus. The Red Hill water crisis in O’ahu, Hawai’i continues to spark outrage among residents, particularly Native Hawaiians. Local activists have taken up the issue all the way to the United Nations, demanding a formal investigation into the facility. Gomes discusses her and her fellow activists’ demands to demilitarize Hawai’i and the Pacific at large.Show Notes:What A Day is going on break for Memorial Day weekend. We’ll be back with a new episode on Wednesday, June 1st.KSAT: “Remembering the victims of the Uvalde elementary school shooting” – https://bit.ly/3MOvdSVNew York Times: “How to Help Victims of the Uvalde School Shooting” – https://nyti.ms/3LNCnFKNew York Times: “Uvalde Had Prepared for School Shootings. It Did Not Stop the Rampage” – https://nyti.ms/3LOnKSBGrist: “Following 14,000-gallon fuel spill, Pacific representatives call for UN investigation” – https://bit.ly/3NuGNTkGlobal Indigenous Youth Caucus – https://www.globalindigenousyouthcaucus.org/Follow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/whataday/For a transcript of this episode, please visit crooked.com/whataday

It's Friday, May 27th. I'm Gideon Resnick. And I'm Travelle Anderson, and this is What A Day. We were installing big mirrors in the homes of Republican senators, so they have to look at themselves all the time. Yes, of course, their view of reality is so distorted, they might like this, in which case we will take away the mirrors. Yeah, we'll just rip them down and really mess up the drywall. It's going to cost a lot to replace. I'm saying it right now. we will take away the mirrors. Yeah, we'll just rip them down and really mess up the drywall.

It's going to cost a lot to replace. Saying it right now. On today's show, Oklahoma enacts the country's strictest anti-abortion law, plus Native activists want to demilitarize Hawaii and maybe make it no longer a U.S. state. They're practicing all of their war games here on our beloved homeland. That is coming up. But first, we'll have the latest on the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. In a moment, we're going to talk about how the focus is now on the police, because some parents are saying that officers did not respond fast enough after the shooter entered the school. However, we start by remembering the victims.

19 of the 21 people killed were children. They were fourth graders at the school. We mentioned several on our show yesterday, but here is info about more of them because their personal details have since become public. Nevaeh Braho was 10 years old. In a Facebook post, her aunt said that Nevaeh's name is heaven spelled backward and described her as an angel. McKenna Elrod, also age 10. Her aunt said McKenna liked to sing and dance, play softball, and quote, her smile would light up a room. Jose Flores, junior, age 10. He was an honor student and was the eldest of four kids. His mother said he was always great with babies, especially his baby brother. Ellie Garcia, also age 10. Her grandparents said she loved the movie Encanto, wanted to be a teacher, and dreamed of wearing a purple dress to her quinceañera.

Tess Marie Mata, also 10. Her older sister Faith posted a series of pictures to remember Tess, including her snoozing in bed, snuggling with a cat, and doing the splits. Miranda Mathis, age 11, the mother of Miranda's friend, said she, quote, was very loving and very talkative when I was around, and that Miranda would often ask her to do her hair. Leila Salazar, age 10, her father said Leila danced to TikTok videos and sang along with him

to the Guns N' Roses song, Sweet Child of Mine, every morning on the way to school. And finally, there's Joe Garcia. He was not shot on Tuesday. He was the husband to Arma Garcia, one of the two teachers who was killed. But yesterday, his nephew posted on Twitter that Joe, quote, passed away due to grief. Reportedly, Joe had just come back home Thursday morning from visiting the memorial at the school and then collapsed because of a heart attack. Joe and Arama were married for 24 years and had four children. We'll have links to the local news organizations that have been sharing the stories of these victims, as well as how you can help their families. That will all be in our show notes.

Yes. Let's turn now to a big issue from yesterday. How police in Uvalde responded to the shooter. Victor Escalon, the regional director for the Texas Department of Public Safety, led this press conference yesterday that resulted in quite a bit more questions than answers. All right. Tell us, what did he say? Yeah, there was a lot here. For one thing, he said that the shooter was outside Rob Elementary for 12 minutes firing shots before he entered the building. That's obviously a significant span of time.

He then apparently entered the building and barricaded himself in a classroom. On the way, he did not encounter any law enforcement, according to Escalon, which directly contradicts what authorities have been previously saying, that an officer confronted the gunman outside the school. The first officers apparently arrived about four minutes after the gunman entered and retreated initially to wait for backup. However, it took a period of about an hour for a border patrol tactical team to actually get into the classroom and shoot the gunman. An hour is a very long time for such a emergency situation. I think we can all agree to that. So this new timeline that we're hearing about has got many people,

including the parents of the victims, incensed. Could you tell us a little bit about why? Yeah, I mean, it's kind of apparent, right? Because numerous questions remained, including why there were differences in the initial statements that the other officials had made, why this all took so long, and how the gunman was apparently able to enter through an unlocked door. Here is CNN's Shimon Prokopetz pressing Victor Escalon from Texas Department of Public Safety and funneling some of the frustrations with the lack of answers here. You guys have said that he was barricaded. Can you explain to us how he was barricaded and why you guys cannot breach that door? So I am taking all your questions into consideration. We will be doing updates. We will be doing updates to answer those questions. Answer that question now, sir. What is your name? Shimon Prokopets from CNN. Shimon, I hear you.

Because we've been given a lot of bad information, so why don't you clear all of this up now and explain to us how it is that your officers who were in there for an hour, yes, rescuing people, but yet no one was able to get inside that room. Shimon, we will circle back with you.

We want to answer all your questions. We want to give you the why. That's our job. So give us time. I'm taking all your questions. I'm taking them the why that's that's our job so give us time i'm taking all your questions i'm taking them back to talk to the team can you tell us how the door was barricaded thank you for being here have a good we'll talk soon we'll talk soon thank you as a journalist that is a wild clip to be asking questions and not get answers and to see how he tried to evade. That's wild. Yep. Now, this stretch of time that we're talking about roughly an hour was absolute agony for parents of the children inside. Some of them were talking about what was happening while they were outside the school. What did we learn

there? Yeah, this is where a lot of the most damning eyewitness accounts are emerging. So Javier Cazares, whose daughter Jacqueline was one of the 19 children killed, told the Washington Post that he and a group of men were gathered outside the school and were told to move back. He said, quote, we didn't care about us. We wanted to storm the building. He later learned that his daughter had died. Another witness said that they saw police arriving but didn't get why they weren't all kind of rushing into the building. The following is from a video posted to Facebook by a man outside the school and verified by the Washington Post. These cops are right here. Bro, there's a fucking shooting at the school and these fucking cops are telling everybody to leave. Everybody's here trying to pick up their

fucking kids. They're saying that the shooter's in a new building. I don't know if they had a new building. Like, if they got a shot, shoot them or something. Fuck. Look, they're just all fucking parked and outside, man. They need to go in there. Oh, my God. You can feel their frustration and confusion, right, at what's going down.

What else were some of the other people outside of the school saying? Yeah, some of this is even more inexplicable, honestly. Angelique Rose Gomez drove 40 miles to get to Robb Elementary, where her children go to school, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. She said, quote, the police were doing nothing. And after a few minutes, she told the publication that she was put in handcuffs for purportedly intervening in an active investigation. The U.S. Marshal Service, who Gomez said were responsible for the handcuffing, claimed that they hadn't handcuffed anyone on the scene. And Gomez is telling she convinced local officers who she knew to have the marshal let her go. Then she jumped

the fence, ran inside, and grabbed her children. So you have law enforcement not fully explaining what all happened here and when, and these parents just rightfully distraught and enraged. So distraught and enraged that a parent has to actually risk her own life to get her own kids because the police aren't doing anything outside. Okay, interesting. And we know that in the absence of any substantive federal legislation on guns, a lot of money and resources have gone into security measures for law enforcement at schools, the line that Republican politicians continue to take. What do we know about that in terms of Uvalde? It seems like they were prepared, in essence. The New York Times reported that as recently as 2020, there were officers from a number of different agencies in a school in Uvalde

walking the hallways in a drill to prepare for a possible gunman. School officials also reportedly doubled their budget for security, adding officers and the separate police force for the city itself deployed a SWAT team to learn layouts of buildings. But just because there is a budget for it doesn't mean it's going to translate into safety for children. We know historically that federal dollars have been given to schools for campus officers after the Columbine shooting in 1999. And there isn't a lot of substantive evidence that that alone is decreasing gun violence in schools, particularly when we talk about these instances that we have of so many mass shootings since then.

We'll link to the story, but it goes into more details on what specifically Texas has budgeted for school safety following another school shooting in 2018 at a high school near Houston, as well as the lack of substantial evidence that lockdown drills keep kids safe. We'll have much more on this soon

and delve into this specific topic a little bit more, but that is the latest for now. Let's get to some headlines. Headlines. Oklahoma officially became the state with the country's strictest anti-abortion law on Wednesday. Republican Governor Kevin Stitt signed a bill that effectively bans all abortions. This comes after he signed a different bill earlier this month that banned the procedure after six weeks of pregnancy.

But this new one goes much further. It outlaws abortions starting at fertilization in all but a few cases. Those cases include if it is necessary to save the pregnant person's life or if the pregnancy is a result of rape or incest that was reported to law enforcement. Important caveat. And similar to Texas's state law, it relies on private citizens to sue anyone who helps someone terminate a pregnancy. The law took effect immediately and will have a disastrous impact

on not only Oklahomans, but also people who have been traveling north to Oklahoma after Texas's own six-week ban went into effect last September. Disgraced actor Kevin Spacey is back in the spotlight and not for good news. Yesterday, prosecutors in England filed criminal charges against him for four counts of sexual assault. Spacey is accused of assaulting three men in the UK, one in 2005, another in 2009, and the last in 2013. Even though the charges were authorized, they can't be formally applied until Spacey enters England or Wales, and officials have not yet said whether they'll seek an extradition if the actor does not turn himself in. Reports in recent months have said the actor is currently shooting various films in Europe

and is attempting to make a comeback in Hollywood. Apparently, it's no longer enough for him to post a YouTube video every Christmas where he loses grip on reality and becomes his character from a canceled Netflix show. If you don't know these videos that I am referencing, my advice is to not look them up. Do not do it. Spacey was first accused of sexual assault in 2017 in America when actor Anthony Rapp, known for his role in Rent, accused Spacey of making sexual advances towards him when he was just 14 years old and Spacey was 26. Since then, other accusers have come forward as well some legal updates from the man who pioneered a defense known as ripping up evidence and throwing it in the toilet that's right former

president donald trump in new york an appellate court upheld an order yesterday requiring trump his son donald jr and his daughter ivanka to sit for a deposition in a civil case that was brought by new york attorney general letitia james. James alleges Trump's business falsified the value of its assets to get better loan rates and pay fewer taxes. If Trump and his brood are deposed, they will likely invoke their Fifth Amendment rights not to self-incriminate. Eric Trump did that 500 times when he was ordered to testify for this case in 2020. Sibling rivalries will probably push Donald Jr. to plead the fifth 501 times, while Ivanka will do it 10,000 times or more in order of best child. Moving on to Trump's other legal problems, reports from CNN and the New York Times indicate that the Justice Department

is ramping up its investigation of the plan to install an alternate slate of MAGA-brained electors who would have overturned the result of the 2020 election. The DOJ has allegedly subpoenaed some of the people behind this plan, including one of Trump's chief legal advisors, John Eastman, and his lawyer and partner in large flowing pants, Rudy Giuliani. The goal from here will be to determine whether crimes were committed as part of the alternate electors scheme. The enduring importance of cursive was put on full display in Michigan yesterday, where forged signatures led a state elections board

to disqualify five Republican candidates for governor. These candidates apparently all hired the same petition circulators to gather the 15,000 names they each needed to qualify for the primary, which is in August. But those petition circulators had better things to do, like swim in one of Michigan's many beautiful lakes.

So they faked an estimated 68,000 signatures overall and didn't even try to hide it that much. Describing the signature sheets, attendees of yesterday's election board hearing said, quote, we saw dead people on those petitions. We saw people who we knew were ill because they were neighbors of ours. And they said the fakes, quote, slap you in the face. Wow. Importantly here, these candidates didn't just decide to run last week. Among them are two top tier candidates, James Craig and Perry Johnson, who had a real shot at getting the nomination to oppose Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. Yesterday's result will probably still be challenged in court,

so this isn't necessarily over. The state says the final slate of candidates needs to be locked in by June 3rd. And soon after that, the Republicans that make it through can move on from doing election fraud to accusing other people of doing it because that's what they do yeah and the problem now is if they get more fake signatures they have run out potentially of dead people and ill people that the people at the election board seem to know you know they'll just walk up and down the cemetery and pull names and hope that the folks don't know who they are yeah i would love to see the messages going around in the group text of the election board folks being like is this the kathy that we know who is not with us right now be like oh that's my auntie's name she died five years ago what's going on here

right that's tremendous and bad all at the same time. And those are the headlines. Coming up, we have an interview with a native activist who recently went to the U.N. to detail the atrocities committed by the U.S. military in her home of Hawaii. They're playing their war games and continue to play their war games here on our precious, sacred ancestral homeland. That conversation is coming up after some ads. It's Friday, WOD Squad, and we're going to wrap up today's show with an update on an important story in Hawaii that we've been covering. Yes, this month is Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month. And before it wraps up, we wanted to revisit the Red Hill water crisis on the island of Oahu. Recently, local activists have taken up the issue all the way to

the United Nations, and it's at the point where they no longer want Hawaii to be a U.S. state. More on that in a moment. Yeah, to refresh your memory a bit, back in November, hundreds of residents at a Navy base near Pearl Harbor fell ill after they noticed a foul smell in their drinking water. Petroleum oil had leaked from the Red Hill fuel storage facility into the area's water supply. Several families were displaced as a result, and some people were even hospitalized after unknowingly drinking the contaminated water. Here's Mai Hall, a native Hawaiian resident of military housing in Oahu. We spoke to her in November, and she told us about how she became sick as a result, along with her neighbors. My family and I, we got sick.

My cats were vomiting. My son and I were nauseous. We got headaches. I had bloody stools. My husband had like really bad stomach pains. A lot of my friends took pictures of their kids with blistered bloody lips. Somebody went to the ER for chemical burns inside their mouth. Somebody's five-month pregnant wife went to the ER for uncontrollable vomiting. And somebody's little infant was covered in a red rash from bathing in the water. So this, of course, prompted widespread outrage. People took to the streets in protest, demanding that the fuel storage facility be drained

and shut down for good because it's been leaking ever since the 1940s. In December, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin responded to the unrest and said that Red Hill would be shut down. But to this day, it's still in operation and no one has provided any kind of timeline for that process. They haven't even started defueling the tanks. And just last month, there was another oil spill. Even worse, Hawaii's Department of Health released data a couple of weeks ago showing that oil had been leaking into the Red Hill water well months before the November leak was discovered. So these spills could potentially spread even

further throughout Oahu's water system beyond the Pearl Hickman Harbor base and its surrounding neighborhoods. Yeah, and the news has revived calls from residents, particularly Native Hawaiians, to demilitarize the islands completely. An article in the Honolulu Civil Beat details how Native Hawaiians have long called for the demilitarization of Hawaii ever since U.S. troops forcefully overthrew the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893. And for many of them, the Red Hill water crisis is just the latest example of how harmful the military's presence is to the islands and their people. This all culminated last month when a gathering called the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus called on the United Nations to

intervene on the issue. The caucus is an international group of young activists who weigh in on issues their communities face in hopes to create change. When they were before the UN, caucus members asked the body to formally investigate the Red Hill facility. They also want the United Nations to recognize Hawaii as a colonized territory rather than a U.S. state. The caucus is currently working on a report to present to the U.N. to back up these demands and ideally get its leaders to take some kind of action on the issue. But in the meantime, we wanted to learn more about what this moment has meant to Native Hawaiian activists, so we have with us Makana Lani Gomes. She is a member of the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus and one of the leaders of this effort to

hold the Navy accountable. Makana Lani, thank you so much and welcome to What A Day. Aloha nui kakou. It's an honor to be here with you folks. And so before we get to a little bit more of the caucus's demands, can you remind our listeners about the cultural aspect of this issue and the significance that water holds to you as a native Hawaiian? You know, the call or sometimes the hashtag or what's being associated with this movement is Olaikavai. Like, water is life and life is water. We are made up of so much water and without it, we cannot live. And so we must protect it and we must perpetuate its agency above all else. And why did you want to escalate your frustration, your anger about Red Hill all the way to the UN?

How did that process work? For me, bringing it up that the UN was such an opportunity to highlight the demilitarization that needs to take place in Oceania collectively, you know, the great Moana Nuiakea. We are not a small island nation. We are the ocean. We cry tears and there's salt in our tears. And this is how we know we are of the ocean. And so I wanted to ensure that it was a call for Hawaii, but also a call for all of our brothers and sisters and family and two-spirit Mahu folks who are living throughout this world being occupied by these forces, these very violent forces. And so we really saw that as an opportunity to elevate the voice. Our kupuna, our teachers have been asking for this since what seems like time immemorial, since, you know, the USS Boston rolled up and, you know, imprisoned our queen.

Ever since then, really, we've been asking to leave because you have not stewarded this place well. You have only used it and abused it. into Red Hill that you all have requested the UN do, the caucus has also asked them to recognize Hawaii as a colonized territory, like Guam instead of a U.S. state. Could you talk a little bit about the importance of that language shift in this effort that you all are undertaking? The reinscription is also similar to the call for demilitarization. If we get re-inscribed, then the United Nations has to ensure that America makes an effort to steward our ability to self-govern. And so I think re-inscription is a hope and a dream that, you know, if we do get re-inscribed, the United Nations can hopefully hold them, you know, the United States accountable to steward that, what that looks like, that

consultation, that meaningful consultation and consent with Hawaii. And as you're saying, the call to demilitarize Hawaii isn't new. So can you briefly break down some ways in which the U.S. military has disenfranchised Native Hawaiians for our listeners who might not be familiar with all that history? I mean, like we said, in 1893, I mean, because of the force of the U.S. military, they needed a place in the Pacific to house their, I'm going to just call it artillery. It's those kinds of things, like taking up, literally occupying some of the most sacred and precious land on our islands and then bombing it. I mean, we have Kaho'olawe for those,

you know, in the 70s, where they were actively using one of our bombs, cracked the water table. And water tables, that time to heal, that's generational time we're talking about. Time that we don't have because our children are here. And we don't have that kind of time to go ahead and continue to allow them to take up space and place on our lands, our sacred lands of Makua Valley, Pohakuloa on Hawaii Island. I mean, just lower to where Mauna Kea is, they're actively bombing. I mean, they're practicing all of their war games here on our beloved homeland, contaminating water. There's uranium in the land.

We don't know what those effects are. They're playing their war games and continue to play their war games here on our precious sacred ancestral homeland. And then they take those tactics and they abuse and hurt and violate other people. So not only is it physical harm to our land, it is spiritual. Now, there are folks who are against demilitarization, right? They argue that Hawaii is, quote-unquote, lucky to be part of the U.S. as opposed to a more authoritarian country. They also say that the military's presence is necessary to, quote-unquote, protect the islands and stimulate the economy. I wonder what your response is to those types of arguments that people make. I think that's just an outdated narrative. The thing is, Hawaii was recognized by so many countries, treaties.

I mean, the Anglo-Saxon Proclamation recognized that, you know, Hawaii was a sovereign nation, the only non-European to be recognized by Britain and France. But we don't even need to talk about that. What about the sovereignty, the rights of people to be on their ancestral lands without harm? We really have to question, you know, people talk about, well, America is keeping us safe from this country that's going to launch bombs and this and that. But are they really? As we see right now in America, it's only a power elite that they're willing to protect. The intention of America was never to protect Hawaiians and protect the land and perpetuate our culture. It was strictly to commodify. I really question if they value our life and our sacredness. And from your experience working with the caucus, how likely do you think that it is that these demands to not continue to push until someone finally listens, someone comes, someone investigates, someone pushes it. And we're just remaining hopeful and vigilant. Thank you for sharing that. Before we go, for the listeners out there who want to learn more, who want to support what you all are doing,

how can they help? I think it goes back to that inner work, you know, really investigate where are you at in your journey of life, whether you're Indigenous or not, like whose land are you on? I mean, it's simple things like that. What are you doing to cuckold or support those people of that land? You know, Indigenous people are doing so much work in so many different worlds. So I think it's really trying to do some personal work. I mean, yeah, donate. I mean, if you have funds, donate. If you have things, support.

But it's really, what are you personally doing to show up and support those that are marginalized? Well, thank you so much again for all of your time today. We really appreciate it. And I think it's a huge service to our audience for them to be able to think about these things and to start to understand them. So thank you. Mahalo. We will link to the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus in our show notes so you can learn more about her and her fellow activists' work. One more thing before we go. The WOD team is taking off for a break for the long Memorial Day weekend.

We will be back in your feeds on Wednesday, June 1st. That is all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, tighten up those large flowing pants, and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading and not just 68,000 fake signatures like me, What A Day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe.

I'm Travell Anderson. I'm Gideon Resnick. And we'll be back with you on Wednesday. I'm going to a cookout or something. Gonna sit by somebody's pool or something. I don't know. Okay. But I'm glad for a break. Yeah. Stay out of

the humidity if you can. If you can. Or do something about it if you can. I don't know. What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Bill Lance, Jazzy Marine, and Raven Yamamoto are our associate producers. Our head writer is John Milstein, and our executive producers are Leo Duran and me, Gideon Resnick. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka. Keshaga.