WLNS 6 News

MI officials react to Texas school shooting

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) — A Texas community and Americans across the country are still mourning and trying to process the tragic elementary school shooting that happened Tuesday.

The massacre in Uvalde, Texas is now the second deadliest school shooting in American history. In total, 19 children and two teachers were gunned-down, just days before their summer break.

An 18-year-old armed with an AR-15 style weapon stormed a classroom, barricaded himself inside, and shot the students and teachers who were inside.

Michigan U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow was among those who spoke out this week after the shootings. She had planned on talking about school lunches on Wednesday, but the events in Texas changed her speech.

Instead, she asked for bi-partisan support to help end the violence.

“We don’t have to live like this. We don’t have to live like this,” Stabenow said. “The question is how many Republicans would join us to save children’s lives from gun violence? How many? Can we just get started? Leader [Chuck] Schumer has put two bills on the calendar related to background checks. Bi-partisan background checks act, closing the gun show loop. Requiring background checks for gun purchases made through private unlicensed leaders. And the enhanced background check act, which would provide a national background check system enough time to thoroughly review gun sales. Now these are not controversial.”

Candidates running for Michigan governor are sharing their thoughts in the wake of this latest school shooting as well.

The Rundown caught up with Republican Candidate Garrett Soldano, who said it’s not as simple as just banning guns.

“We have to move farther away from just this one issue that, what it seems like is the Democratic party always focuses on guns,” Soldano said. “And if you look at the school shooting unfortunately in Texas, that was a gun-free zone. And so there has to be more emphasis on not only school security, which I’m going to bring to the table as Michigan’s next governor, because this is an all hands, all above approach that we’re going to need.”

Lastly, the Rundown also caught up with Republican Governor Candidate Ralph Rebandt. He says more needs to be done to prevent something like this from happening again.

“What I would do is put gun sniffing dogs in schools, hire retired law enforcement and veterans to help protect these school,” Rebandt said. “Our kids need to know that they can be safe, and not run into these issues here or across the country.”

Watch all of the interviews at the top of the page.