The former president, who was applauded several times at the event, began his speech regretting the massacre, which he described as a “savage atrocity”, and he read the names of the 21 victims with the sound of bells ringing in the background.
Trump attributed all the blame to the attacker’s mental health, ignoring the role of the weapons in the shooting: “the monster that committed this crime is pure evil, pure cruelty, pure hate,” he said.
The Republican made a strong statement in defense of the Second Amendment of the Constitution, which enshrines the right of Americans to own guns, and lashed out at Democrats for “using the tears of families” to call for greater gun control.
“Every time a disturbed or insane person commits such a horrible crime, there is always a grotesque effort on the part of some to use the suffering to promote their extremist political agenda”, he reproached.
Furthermore, he criticized the “blaming” of the tragedy on the “wonderful NRA” and paraphrased a saying that “the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.”
“When Joe Biden blamed the gun lobby, he was talking about Americans like you, and he was suggesting that Republicans are okay with allowing that these shootings happen in schools”, he said about the president’s speech on Tuesday after the massacre.
Thousands of people gathered this Friday in the surroundings s of the Houston Convention Center to protest the NRA’s annual conference, which held the event despite numerous calls for it to be canceled after the massacre.
The Governor of Texas, Republican Greg Abbott, announced this Friday that ultimately he would not participate in the conference, although he would show a recorded message.
“I am honored to be here in the great state of Texas with the wonderful patriots of the NRA. And unlike some, I didn’t disappoint them by not showing up,” Trump said of the governor.
