In an ominous Facebook post minutes before the attack, the shooter wrote: “You kill innocent women and children by doing US airstrikes”.
Advertisement
The President met with the groups in private.
On Wednesday, a visitation was held for one of the victims of the massacre, 40-year-old Javier Jorge-Reyes.
Obama plans to meet with the families of people killed, comfort survivors of the attack, thank emergency workers and speak about broader issues at stake, Earnest said.
Back in Washington, however, lawmakers paused in efforts to pass gun control legislation, something the Obama administration has backed and the President spoke to in the wake of the Orlando shooting.
“We can’t anticipate or catch every single deranged person who may wish to do harm to his neighbors or his friends or coworkers or strangers”, Obama said.
“Unfortunately, our politics have conspired to make it as easy as possible for a terrorist or just a disturbed indivual like those in Aurora or Newtown to buy extraordinary powerful weapons and they can do so legally”, Obama said.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Obama would deal with the ambiguity by focusing on the victims.
There is, however, resistance to such measures among Republicans who control both houses of Congress and say stricter gun laws would infringe on Americans’ constitutionally protected right to bear arms.
Federal law enforcement officials have said the gunman, Omar Mateen, pledged allegiance to Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi but they have not disclosed any evidence that Mateen had any direct contact with adherents of the terror group or whether he was specifically directed by the Islamic State in any way.
“But the instruments of death were so similar”, he said.
President Barack Obama has arrived in Orlando to console those mourning the deadliest mass shooting in modern USA history.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Wednesday at a rally that the attack would have been “nothing like the carnage” we saw if club goers were armed.
For so many people here who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, the Pulse Nightclub has always been a safe haven, a place to sing and dance, and most importantly, to be who you truly are – including for so many people whose families are originally from Puerto Rico. This imam, by the way, had previously linked the 9/11 terror attacks to the “radicalization” among Middle Eastern youth following the U.S. Persian Gulf war.
“It’s a good time for us to reflect on how we treat each other”, Obama said.
Such visits have become sadly frequent for Obama, whose presidency has coincided with other high-profile mass shootings in San Bernardino, Calif.; Charleston, S.C.; and Newtown, Conn.
Obama called for unity and for working across political lines to stop militant activity. Rep. Corrine Brown (D-Fla.), who represents the congressional district that includes Orlando, also joined Obama on the presidential jet, and they were greeted on the tarmac by Gov. Rick Scott (R) and Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer (D).
He then touched on the ways to prevent such tragedies in the future, saying that “if we want to show the best of humanity, we’re all going to have to work together, at every level of government, across political lines”. “But he’s largely, to a large extent, he’s blaming guns”, Trump said. Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas told CNN that the Senate will hold a series of votes on gun amendments Monday.
Advertisement
Víctor Almodovar lost his “little brother” Stanley Almodovar in the shootings, and, though he said his family was not able to attend the meeting with Obama, they were grateful that he made the visit. Yet in an unexpected twist, Trump said he planned to meet with the National Rifle Association “about not allowing people on the terrorist watch list, or the no-fly list, to buy guns”.
