this is cnn breaking news. hello. i'm john vause at the cnn center in atlanta. in southwest texas a lone gunman has shot and killed at least 19 children and two adults. the gunman is also among the dead killed by law enforcement with an investigation now under way to try and find a motive in his killing spree. he's been identified by police as 18-year-old salvador ramos. three sources telling cnn his first victim was his grandmother. she was airlifted to the hospital in critical condition. in texas about 90 minutes west of san antonio not far from the mexico border. 90% of the students were latino

and were just weeks away from summer break. he crashed his car on the school and was seen running on campus carrying two firearms which were purchased by ramos legally on his 18th birthday. two ar-style 15 rifles were posted. a lone gunman killed 20 children in the first and second grades as well as six adults in newtown, kentucky. joe biden said it's time to stand up to the gun lobby and pass common sense regulations. >> i am sick and tired. we have to act. and don't tell me we can't have an impact on this carnage. i spent my career as a senator and as a vice president working to pass common sense gun laws.

we can't and won't prevent every tragedy, but we know they work and have positive impact. when we passed the assault weapons ban, mass shootings went down. when the law expired, mass shootings tripled. the idea that an 18-year-old kid can walk into a gun store and buy two assault weapons is just wrong. what in god's name do you need an assault weapon for except to kill someone. >> >> the president had just returned from a trip to asia. biden ordered flags at the white house and other government buildings lowered to half staff. cnn's senior justice correspondent evan perez live. in almost every respect this mass shooting is following a very similar pattern to see many others. is there anything investigators have found that stands out as

being significantly different? >> reporter: yeah, john, we cover so many of these and usually by this point talking to law enforcement you're starting to get a picture of the shooter and perhaps some indications of the motivation. we're not getting that at this point, and that's a very notable thing. we have, you know, this incident that happened. apparently he shot -- he shoots the grandmother and then at some point ends up crashing his car outside of this school and then makes his way somehow despite getting into a shootout with a number of officers ends up somehow inside these classrooms where these 19 children are then massacred. so there's a lot of unanswered questions as to how we get here, how this shooter goes from someone who is described by some of his friends as a loner, as a

quiet person, someone who's perhaps bullied in school but was not somebody who acted out to then showing up at this -- at this elementary school and carrying out this horrific, horrific massacre, john. >> we also had this social media posting of the two ar-style weapons on the social media account linked to ramos. was there anything else on that posting which would give a hint to why he did what he did? >> no. that's why we know from talking to some of his friends that recently he started showing pictures of firearms and guns that he wanted to buy, and then more recently because he just turned 18 years old and was eligible to buy these firearms, he apparently acquired them. and so from those conversations we're getting a picture of perhaps some change in the behavior of this -- of this young man. now, from talking to some -- a

coworker, for instance, at a fast food restaurant he worked in, you also get the sense things were not well. one of his friends describes that he didn't have a very good relationship with his -- with his family. low-income family, that they lived there in town. again, these are all things investigators are going to be looking at. we know they already reached out to some of these friends who apparently had conversations with him on snap chat and also video game platforms. all those things are being put together by investigators to try and explain the unexplainable. >> evan, thank you. evan perez there in washington, we appreciate you staying up late. from los angeles is retired special fbi agent.

i want you to listen to estrada from the department of public safety. >> he was observed exiting the vehicle with his own rifle and backpack. he also had a -- he also had body armor with him. that's whenever the isd police officers engaged them. then there was a second call where he entered through the south door of the robb elementary school. he entered, and that's when he started with his gunfire. >> just for the record it was an ar-style weapon. he was wearing body armor. earl ier he shot his grandmother. in almost every respect this is a carbon copy of what happened at sandy hook elementary almost a decade ago. and that begs the question if it happened before, why did it have to happen again? did those kids in sandy hook die

in vain? >> no, i don't think they did, and that's small comfort to their families. every small shooting that we see informs law enforcement of how to stop these, how to predict these, that's one of the things we have to do going forward. i think you're probably going to find that this guy searched out and researched shootings in the past, school shootings. and i would not be surprised at all if he wasn't modeling this after sandy hook because it was the most lethal school shooting at -- sandy hook the shooter killed his mother. in this one he killed his grandmother. they started within an hour or two of each other in the morning time-wise, and i think he was modeling this -- i think he was possibly modeling this after another shooting. >> just quickly he shot and

wounded his grandmother just to get it right. by all accounts police responded quickly but the gunman was still able to shoot 21 people. does that speak in part to the type of weapon being used? >> i think maybe it does, but we're going to have to find out. i've heard wild stories that they may not have gone in for 45 minutes. i hope that's not true. when you get there, you go in. i mean the isd police officers, they knew what was at stake. they engaged him immediately. they knew what a long rifle could do to them, and they engaged him immediately. active shooter protocol is to go to the sound of the gunshots, whether it's one, two, three or four officers you go to the sound of the gunshots and you end the gunfire. and the problem is you're giving up all your safety as a law enforcement officer doing that. there's no such thing as shielding yourself or making yourself safe here. your job is to trade places with

the innocent children in the presence of the shooter, and trade that person for a law enforcement officer with a gun. you need to get there right away. so i applause the border patrol and the police officers who went in there bravely and got him out. now i'm going to wonder if it was 45 minutes why it was. again, i wasn't there and they may have had good reason, but it's not active shooter protocol. >> and with that regard, how is it that an 18-year-old kid with almost no experience handling a rifle was able to shoot a border patrol agent who was engaged in a fire fight but shoot him in the head as well as others? >> i think if he got the weapons he probably trained with the weapons. first thing people do when they get a weapon is they go to the gun range. he probably got some rudimentary training in these.

and one of the things about long rifles they're easier to -- they don't maneuver as well, but it's easier to put a shot accurately than it is with a pistol. >> when you talk about an ar-style weapon there's no recoil. you can sit there shooting one after another sph. >> there's negligible recoil. >> the u.s. president mentioned since the sandy hook massacre there's been 900 incidents of gunfire reported on school grounds and the fbi active shooter report released on monday. from the period 2017 to 2021 active shooter incident data reveals an upward trend, number of incidents revealed in 2021 reveals a 52.5% increase from 2020 and get this a 96.8% increase in 2017. i guess if there is a plan to

prevent shootings in this country it's not really working. >> well, the only national strategy on dealing with these things are rapid active shooter protocols. i used to teach those. what we need is a holistic approach. you can't just say let's get the guns out because even if we could wave a magic wand, you'd still have homicidal people out there looking for a weapon. but we do have to address the guns, don't get me wrong. we have to address school safety for those people who slip through the cracks and get a firearm or worse, get explosives, something like that. schools have to be better protected. they have to be hardened. we have to have an overhaul of our mental health system. it's not just that we have thousands, tens of thousands of homeless on our streets, quite a bit of them because of mental health issues. we're having people like this who we're letting them kill our children because we're not

forcing them or getting them mental health evaluation. we've got to do this in -- not one thing is going to solve this. it's going to be a cultural holistic change. it's going to be like 9/11. before 9/11 you can get on planes pretty easy. now you can't. it's just everything changes. >> got to want to make a change in the first place. thanks for being with us. we appreciate it. in the wake of this shooting many lawmakers and others are offering their thoughts and prayers but little else. there is bipartisan agreement something needs to be done just no agreement on what that something is. when we come back what will it take for the u.s. congress to pass meaningful gun reform?

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elementary school on tuesday by an 18-year-old gun. . two adults were also injured and taken to hospital. investigators believe the shooter acted alone and was killed divergent a fire fight with law enforcement. witnesses say the gunman wearing body armor and a rifle and backpack. tuesday's rampage marks the 30th shooting in a k-12 school in the u.s. this year. on tuesday one of the most passionate pleas for gun control came from the u.s. senator from connecticut, the state where the sandy hook school massacre claimed the lives of 20 children nearly a decade ago. senator chris murphy begged republicans to work with him and other democrats on gun reform. >> this inevitable. these kids weren't unlucky. this only happens in this country and nowhere else. nowhere else do little kids go to school thinking they might be shot that day. nowhere else do parents have to

talk to their kids as i have had to do about why they got locked into a bathroom and told to be quiet for five minutes. nowhere else does that happen except here in the united states of america, and it is a choice. it is our choice to let it continue. what are we doing? >> it's a choice. matthew is the executive director of 97% working to reduce gun violence. matt, thanks for being with us. what really stood out from what senator murphy said is when he said it's a choice. there's a choice being made it seems by a small minority opposed to gun reform. who's a part of this minority? why are they okay with children being shot dead at school, and why do they get to decide for the rest of the country? >> john, i have to say while i'm

happy to be on with you i'm sick of being on and talking about this situation. it is not getting better, and we're about to be in a situation where the supreme court is going to make it easier to walk around with a gun. so the situation may just in fact be getting worse in the short run, and that is the truth. and i know people don't want to hear it. you're asking about the vast minority of people why they have influence, and it's the way people vote and the senate is, the house, ethan's law which is a gun storage law, that came up for a vote that would pass. in the senate we don't even get a vote on these things. it's not -- part of the problem, john, is people don't understand gun owners who really need to step up in this situation, 84% of them favor background checks. almost 84% of nra members favor background checks. but you're right it's that 3% or

so that we hear about and they're the loudest voices in the room on social media, legacy media, and it's not right. we need to be listening to more people, and gun owners have to be a part of this conversation. we need gun owners. >> which is what your group is all about. you mentioned this it's about to get worse, and it's been almost a year since texas passed a whole bunch of measures to allow guns to be concealed without permits and prevents state officials from enforcing gun laws and similar measures have been taken across the u.s. texas will join 19 other states, five other states have declared themselves second amendment sanctuaries. why is there this momentum easing gun restrictions, why is that happening? and the move to tighten them is going nowhere? >> we've seen an incredible surge in gun sales. it skyrocketed. so we're seeing more of these

mass shootings as people have gotten out, since, you know, the covid situation changed a few months ago, and more and more of these mass shootings. i was on cnn a week and a half ago with buffalo. i think we've had ten mass shootings since buffalo until today. i mean, the numbers are outrage. and it is true some of these states are making it much easier to walk around with a gun, there's no question about it. and what we need to happen is we need, first of all, john, of course most people are responsible with a gun. it should go without saying. we're not getting rid of guns in this country. there's 400 million guns in this country, more guns than there are people. so we need people to be responsible. it's something we're all working on, we work on it, too. but we need gun owners to come to the table bought, john, we can't do the same thing over and over again. you're right we need universal background checks, and if we have a vote on it, it will fail until we do something

differently. and what we need to do differently, and i don't want to be self-promoting at, john. but we spent a long time, a year, talking to everyone what's missing in the gun debate before we decided to do something. and what was missing was gun owners. we know gun owners favors red flag laws. lindsey graham favors red flag laws. florida has red flag laws, but we don't spend enough money on red flag laws. so that may have helped prevent, for example, the buffalo shooting. >> when you say we are you talking about gun owners -- that's what your group does those who want gun reform together with gun owners. how do you take that from your group into congress? >> well, it's a great question, john. we have two former nra lobbyists, for example, on our advisory board because they believe in gun reform. we have republicans on our team.

we have democrats on our team. john, i will say congress has listened to us. we've met with dozens of members of congress. we've met with republican members of congress, but the senate is the senate and we can't get a vote on background. even if we did we'd lose. we need gun owners to come to the table, but we also need, john, when the laws are written gun owners need to be at the table because, again, whatever we've been doing until now has not worked. you would have thought newtown, things would have worked. i'm sure you've had fred gutenberg on this show. they lost their daughter jamie. she was shot in the back at school in florida. their story is unbelievable, it's heart breaking and we keep doing it over and over again. what are we going to do that's different? and the thing we ned to do is because gun owners are such a powerful group and there's 120 guns for every 100 people in this country as opposed to

example australia where it's 1,500 people, we need to listen to them. they don't feel they have a seat at the table in gun reform. we need to give them that seat. >> you mentioned sandy hook and days after that. president obama would go onto describe it as one of the darkest days of his presidency. listen to him speaking three years after that killing spree. >> our unalienable rights to liberty and the pursuit of happiness were stripped from college kids in blacksburg in santa barbara and from high school in columbine and from first graders in new town. first graders. and from every family who never imagined that their loved one

would be taken from our lives by a bullet from a gun. >> you know, the question i hear most often and you probably do, too, is if nothing happens sandy hook when? as biden said a few hours ago when does this country say enough? >> right. and the key is, john, we have to bring everybody to the table. by the way, john, we've become very okay with violence in this country. we've become very okay with death in this country. you've covered it over and over again, a million people died with covid. it seems to be no big deal to a lot of people. people die from gun violence, 42,000 a year. it seem tuesday be no big deal. i've asked the president's office about having a summit of social media organizations, gun organizations, people who train people how to use a gun. we need to entertain

organizations because why are we so okay with all these people dying? why is that okay in this country and nowhere else? and we all need to come together, john, i do say especially gun owners but all of us what are we doing wrong and what can we do differently? we're not going to get that 42,000 down to zero, but we've got to get that down, john. you can't go to elementary school, can't go to the super market, can't go to the movie theater. we're supposed to be a free country. there's no freedom if you can't go anywhere and think you're going to be safe, and what kind of country is this becoming? so we need to do something and do something differently. >> matt, thank you for that. it's good to have you with us. >> thanks, john. like so many others they went to school tuesday morning but the 19 youngest victims of this mass shooting will never be coming home. when we come back, what can be done to make schools safer?

how can delicate precious lives be protected from weapons used in war zones?

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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 when we do what we all know in our gut needs to be done? >> an emotional plea from the u.s. president as he called for courage, to stand up to the industry and mourn the loss of so many young lives in texas. these 19 children and two adults were killed in the shooting at robb elementary just days before the summer break. texas officials identified the gunman as 18-year-old salvador ramos. he was killed by law enforcement officers, and police believe he acted alone, still a motive

remains unknown. sources say the gunman first shot his grandmother. she's now in critical condition before he crashed izcar near the school. texas state senator renaldo gutierrez says he legally purchased two assault rifles on his 18th birthday. and some parents are still waiting to hear about the fate of their children. >> so they're taking dna from parents and family members and trying to match them to those children that are deceased or the ones that are in the hospital. not all of the children have been reunited. it's been a very, very devastating sight right now when we have people that are finding out as we speak that their loved -- that their child is deceased. >> back in february of 2018 a high school in florida was the scene of a deadly mass shooting. 15 students, a teacher and football coach all killed at the

marjory stoneman douglas. earlier he spoke to cnn about his first thoughts after this latest school shooting. >> shock, horror, anger at the fact that these shootings are preventable, but they're also predictable. anger at the fact i speak to you tonight i know we're going to have this happen again because we haven't done anything. you know, i've listened to all the talk tonight about why did this happen. and, listen, when my daughter was killed just over four years ago we had 300 million weapons in america. now we're at 400 million plus and ghost guns. this isn't rocket science. this isn't hard to figure out. we are making it easier for those who intend to kill to have the means to do so.

>> jullia kayyem is with us live from providence, rhode island. thank you for being with us. a total of 400 million guns now and when you marry that with data from the fbi which shows a surge in mass shootings in recent years is this one of those instances where cause and effect is a legitimate argument to make? more guns means more shootings? >> yes. the basic fact is if guns made us safer we'd be the safest country on earth. and the data actually also shows that schools that have school shootings or active shooters with armed officials -- actually there's no evidence to suggest those are better or worse. and we are still getting the details of what happened today, but let's just go back one week when i think i was with you to new york. there was an armed former police

officer who engaged the killer before he started killing massively. the killer had body armor that we know that to be the case today as well. the assailant today also was engaged before he made it to the school. we don't know the nature of that engagement, but he was -- law enforcement did encounter him. so, i mean, we are stopping them before they get to these mass killings. they just have the power to kill lots of children very quickly, and that's -- and until we do something about that capacity to kill where there's no response time you can do as many active shooter drills as you want. nothing is going to save these children or anyone for that matter at a soft target like this. >> i was thinking today about the parents of the children who have died in other shootings. how must they feel? they must feel their kids died for nothing.

>> yeah, you just can't fathom what's going on in texas tonight. as a parent i'm being much more explicit on-air because i think it's very important we not sanitize what's going on. i just did it. we even use the word shooter rather than gunman. i mean, use the language. this is someone who used a gun to kill people. what's happening in texas tonight is there are 19 families who know that their child is dead but that child is likely not identified yet because the kind of weapon that was used is meant to essentially eviscerate an adult male. so imagine what it's doing to a 4, 5 or 6-year-old child. that parent then needs to identify that child through dna or some other feature that only a parent would know. and i mean i think about that with my kids. what's the birthmark that would let me identify them? no parent should have to go through that let alone so many on a single day. >> since you raised it, once again the weapon of choice here

was a semiautomatic ar-15-style weapon. while all guns can kill, not all guns can kill equally. he described the damage when an ar-15 compared to a handgun. one looks like a grenade went off inside the body, the other looks like a bad knife cut. a round from an ar travels a lot faster than a handgun and doesn't even have to hit a bone to shatter it. so when you talk about a kid how much more damage is done to a body of a child haz 5 or 6 years old? >> so much damage that the child is not recognizable. that is the key here is that this is not all shootings are the same. i know if you don't know gun culture or guns that may sound weird. but it is true these exist to implode the body. this is what surgeons will tell you. so imagine this kind of velocity

going into a child. this is what's going on tonight. and we have to be graphic about it because if we sanitize it it's just, oh, yeah, another shooting or a shooting. these are different in nature, and that's why focusing on a particular type of weapon or the age that someone can access it or the number that someone can have, right? if you have one why do you need two? these are the kind of things we do know the vast majority of americans believe in. we just can't get the political process to respond. and so it just -- you know, out of frustration over whatever else i have tonight, part of it is just stop being -- i need to stop sanitizing this to be honest. i'm on-air with you a lot on this and i'll say a shooting. this is what's happening tonight. >> to take it one step further a wound from a gun can be healed or fixed whatever you want with one surgery. with an ar-15 it's up to ten.

that's how much damage it does. did you think the texas governor seemed reluctant today to identify what the weapon is here? >> i'm so glad you say that. people who raise gun control who want our country to reflect the majority opinion are often accused of being too political. i wanted to make it clear today, first of all, having a governor come out first is unique in terms of a mass shooting. you generally have the police chief. you do not want to make it political from the get go and also local control is important. it's the locals who are going to know what's going on. they'll know if the families have been notified. it seemed premature to come out that quickly as governor abbott did. and the second thing he did, the specific language i don't remember but he basically said we know there was a handgun, we don't know if there was anything else. well, that is factually incorrect. if he had been engaged and he

was dead, they already knew what the weapons were. they knew. they knew at that stage, and i think it's important to call out the texas governor because his critics are often called politicizing. from before the families knew that their kids were dead he was trying to claim that -- that he had no knowledge of which gun was used. meanwhile he's leading the press conference. >> it was unusual to say the least. >> every way. >> julia, i hope we never have to have this conversation again but i'm terrified we will. our breaking news coverage continues after a deadly shooting in a small texas town at the elementary school. we'll be back right after this.

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especially when you're young and in school. so these students are going to be going back into school soon, and they are going to live lives and have child hoods and early adult hoods cleatply completely informed by this tragedy. >> that was his reaction. authorities say an 18-year-old gunman shot 19 children and two adults at an elementary school in the town of uvalde. officials say he shot his grandmother before the rampage. joe biden renewing his calls for common sense gun legislation as well as expressing his clear outrage. >> these kinds of mass shootings rarely happen anywhere else in the world.

why? they have mental health problems. they have domestic disputes in other countries. they have people who are lost, but these kind of mass shootings never happen with the kind of frequency they happen in america. why? why are we willing to live with this carnage? why do we keep letting this happen? where in god's name is our backbone? >> the president is now imploring lawmakers to turn this pain into action on gun control legislation. this school shooting in texas is already among the deadliest in u.s. history. here are some of the others. in 2007 a student opened fire on a campus in blacksburg, virginia before killing himself. a 20-year-old shot and killed 20 children, six adults, his mother

and then himself. parkland, florida, 2018, a 19-year-old killed 17 students and staff at marjory stoneman douglas high school. earlier cnn spoke with nicole. her son dylan was one of the children killed at sandy hook elementary school. she stressed these kind of tragedies are just not inevitable. >> this gun violence that we're experiencing on a daily basis in schools and communities and dpr grocery stores and movie theaters across the country, this is not an inevitable part of our life. there are actions we can take to prevent it if we have the courage and the perseverance to lean-in and take those actions and not just be apathetic and accept this is the way it is. people said that after sandy

hook with 20 6-year-olds and 7-year-olds and educators dying that would be rock bottom and here we are with another elementary school and the thousands of mass shootings that have happened in between. >> u.s. vice president kamala harris addressed this tragedy while speaking at an awards gala on tuesday night. she made a passionate plea. she said enough is enough and call for action on gun control legislation. >> i would all say at moments like this we would all say naturally our hearts break, but our hearts keep getting broken. you know, i think so many -- there's so many elected leaders in this room. you know what i'm talking about. every time a tragedy like this happens our hearts break. and our broken hearts are nothing compared to the broken hearts of those families, and

yet it keeps happening. so i think we all know and have said many times with each other enough is enough. enough is enough. as a nation we have to have the courage to take action and understand the nexus between what makes for reasonable and sensible public policy to ensure something like this never happens again. we'll take a short break. when we come back, a lot more on this tragedy in texas. you're watching cnn. ♪ ♪

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president joe biden has ordered u.s. flags to be lowered to half staff now through

saturday as this country grapples with yet another horrific mass shooting. at least 19 children and two adults were killed when a gunman opened fire. tragedy unfolding in the community of uvalde, texas, 85 miles west of san antonio. it marks the worst mass shooting since 2012 at sandy hook elementary in connecticut. this time the shooter was reportedly killed by law enforcement. according to texas governor greg abbott the 18-year-old suspect was a student at a local high school. officials say he also shot his grandmother before going to the school on his shooting spree. she's now in critical condition at a hospital. according to a state senator the gunman legally purchased the weapons he used, two assault rifles, ar-15 style that he bought for his 18th birthday. the #steve kerr head coach of the golden state warriors was

visibly angry and shaken. an outspoken advocate for gun reform kerr was in texas tuesday night for the playoff game against the mavericks, but instead of talking basketball he used his pregame conference to rail about the sents inaction on gun control. >> in the last ten days we've had elder leblack people killed in a supermarket in buffalo, asian church goers killed in southern california, and now we have children murdered at school. when are we going to do something? do you realize that 90% of americans regardless of political party want background check, universal background checks. 90% of us. we are being held hostage by 50 senators in washington who refuse to even put it to a vote despite what we the american people want. they won't vote on it because they want to hold onto their own power.

it's pathetic. i've had enough. >> the league held a moment of silence before the game. this issue is very personal for kerr. his father was killed by a gunman in 1984 while he was serving as president of the american university beirut. the south texas blood and tissue center has already announced an emergency blood drive for wednesday. appointments and walk in donations are all welcome. thank you for watching "cnn newsroom." i'm john vause. our breaking news coverage of yet another school shooting, this one at an elementary school in texas continues with rosemary church after a short break. you're watching cnn.

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>> announcer: this is cnn breaking news. hello and welcome to our viewers joining us here in the united states and all around the world. i'm rosemary church. we are following breaking news this hour. 19 children and two adults killed in a shooting at an elementary school in southwest texas. authorities say the gunman, 18-year-old salvador ramos, acted alone and was killed by law enforcement officers. his motive right now is unclear. three sources tell cnn ramos shot his grandmother before going to the school. a state senator says the woman was airlifted to san antonio and is in critical condition. this all happened in the small town of uvalde in texas, about 90 minutes west of san antonio near the u.s. border with mexico. about 90% of the students at robb elementary school are