Rep. Tony Gonzales, a Republican who represents Uvalde and other border communities in southwest Texas, called on Department of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw to resign on Thursday over the agency’s response to the Robb Elementary School shooting, which left 19 children and two teachers dead.
McCraw testified before the Texas Public Safety Commission on Thursday and insisted that the agency “did not fail the community.”
“If DPS as an institution failed the families, failed the school or failed the community of Uvalde, then absolutely, I need to go,” McCraw said Thursday morning. “But I can tell you this right now, DPS as an institution, OK, right now, did not fail the community, plain and simple.”
Following the meeting, Gonzales became the first major Republican official to call for McCraw’s resignation.
Col. Steven McCraw, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, speaks during a news conference outside Robb Elementary School, three days after a gunman killed nineteen children and two adults in a mass shooting, in Uvalde, Texas, U.S. May 27, 2022.
( Reuters/Marco Bello)
Brett Cross, whose niece was murdered in the shooting, confronted McCraw about his promise to step down if an investigation showed his agency was culpable.
“If you are a man of your word, then you would retire,” Cross told McCraw.
Other officials have also called for McCraw’s resignation, including state Sen. Rolan Gutierrez, a Democrat who represents Uvalde.
“All of these officers, right up to McCraw FAILED,” Gutierrez tweeted Thursday. “They must resign or be fired!”
Uvalde police officers and other law enforcement officers are seen responding to a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, in a bodycam video recorded on May 24, 2022.
(Uvalde Police Department)
Last week, Texas DPS fired Sgt. Juan Maldonado, who was one of the first state troopers to arrive at Robb Elementary School during the shooting on May 24.
Six other Texas DPS officers are also under investigation for their actions that day. One of those officers, Crimson Elizondo, was hired by the Uvalde School District’s police force earlier this month but was fired days later when it was revealed that she resigned from Texas DPS while under investigation for her response to the shooting.
McCraw has called law enforcement’s response an “abject failure,” but has pinned the blame on former Uvalde School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo, who he identified as the incident commander.
Former Uvalde School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo speaks at a press conference following the shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, U.S., May 24, 2022.
(Mikala Compton/USA TODAY Network via Reuters )
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Arredondo has argued that he did not see himself as being in charge. After Arredondo was fired in August, his lawyer called it an “illegal and unconstitutional public lynching.”
Nearly 400 law enforcement officers from various agencies responded to the shooting, but more than 70 minutes elapsed before a Border Patrol tactical team breached the classroom and killed the shooter.
Fox News’ Stephen Sorace contributed to this report.
