In Person and on Social Media, Beto O'Rourke Stays With Uvalde
In Person and on Social Media, Beto O'Rourke Stays With Uvalde
Democrat's confrontation with Texas Republicans was just the beginning
News cameras captured Democratic gubernatorial candidate Beto O'Rourke confront his opponent — incumbent Republican Gov Greg Abbott — Tuesday at a news conference just hours after a gunman murdered 19 children and two teachers at a small elementary school in Uvalde, Texas.
Abbott and the array of Texas Republican officials packed in the news conference responded angrily at O'Rourke, when the former congressman challenged Abbott to do more to prevent the sort of mass, horrific gun violence which gripped Uvalde from happening again.
O'Rourke was escorted out of the conference. But if you thought that was the end of his public focus on the murder in Uvalde and he had already packed up his campaign and just moved on to the next stop on the campaign trail, you would be wrong.
In person and on social media, he has remained completely engaged with Uvalde and the friends and loved ones who have just begun grieving the dead.
“There will be more Uvaldes, El Pasos, Sutherland Springs, and Santa Fes until we decide to put the lives of our kids ahead of the political careers of gun lobby politicians like Greg Abbott,” O'Rourke tweeted.
The Democrat has turned his Twitter feed over to the issues of Uvalde and rampant gun violence.
A Texas Tribune story highlighting the six mass shootings in Texas during Abbott’s 7½ years in office, is but one of the retweets O'Rourke is spooling on his Twitter feed.
“He has offered prayers and condemned each. But on Wednesday, Abbott offered no substantive suggestions on how the state might prevent future mass shootings,” the Tribune article was captioned.
He also traveled a few hours away to Houston to take part in — and tweet out — Friday's rally against gun violence, outside the National Rifle Association's convention which went ahead in Houston, despite the events earlier this week.
The candidate told those at the rally that they need to get “in the faces” of Republicans in an attempt to reform gun policy.
“Get in their faces before another child is shot in the face,” O'Rourke said, telling protesters outside the NRA convention to “fight” against Republicans because the “time to stop the next mass shooting is right now.”
He's also using social media to speak to Lone Star voters across the state.
More: O'Rourke put an Uvalde GoFundMe campaign in front of his 2.2 million Twitter followers.
And O'Rourke is one of the few who are still trying to put the Uvalde dead — particularly all of those young children and their stories — front and center.
Such is the case with Alithia Ramirez, a young girl who had just turned 10 before being gunned down as she studied.
“Alithia was killed yesterday. Her parents welcomed me into their home today. Balloons from Alithia’s 10th birthday were still up as was her amazing art. They want the world to know what a beautiful, talented, happy girl she was. They never want this to happen to another kid,” O'Rourke tweeted.
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