Joe Biden has weighed in on the disturbing revelations about the police response to the Uvalde school shooting. Multiple reports have painted a bleak picture of officers waiting around for an hour, refusing to enter the building to try to stop Salvador Ramos’ rampage. Videos of parents being detained and tased outside have also made waves.
Only after a tactical team from the Border Patrol arrived was the classroom, which the first responding officers inexplicably barricaded the shooter in, leaving him to murder almost every child in it, breached and the shooter neutralized.
There has been near-universal outrage over the situation, but as expected, Joe Biden has managed to get on the wrong side of another issue. When asked whether he would call for an investigation into the law enforcement response, he refused to do so.
The White House refused to call for an investigation into the police response to the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, saying President Joe Biden “has the utmost respect for the men and women of law enforcement.”
Police have been criticized for their slow response to the massacre, with parents reportedly attempting to enter the school themselves before a Border Patrol team finally rushed in.
What’s so astonishing about this is how out of character it is for Biden. Remember, this is the same guy who trashed police after they justifiably shot Jacob Blake. He’s the same guy who went after the Border Patrol for having reins on their horses, falsely accusing them of whipping migrants. He’s the same guy who still, even after having all the facts for years, blames police for shooting Michael Brown. Yet, in a situation actually worthy of rebuke and investigation, he’s got nothing to offer but praise?
Color me extremely skeptical that Biden has had an awakening. Rather, I believe he’s being overtly political in his sudden tone shift regarding law enforcement. Why? Because in this situation, if he admits the police royally screwed up, it takes attention away from his chosen prescription, which is gun control, gun control, and more gun control.
It has become abundantly clear that there was a multitude of things that could have directly prevented or limited the damage in Uvalde. The terrible police response is the big one people are currently focused on, but there’s also the fact that the back door was unlocked and no SRO was on campus. But Biden doesn’t want to talk about those things because they aren’t about guns. They aren’t about ineffective universal background checks and unworkable fantasies about confiscation.
In short, I find Biden’s refusal to not criticize the police in this situation, after he’s done so in so many other situations where the police actually didn’t deserve it, to be incredibly cynical. As always, he’s operating as a rabid partisan, seeking to protect his talking points at all costs, to the point of ignoring the real solutions that are staring him in the face.