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Mourners visit a memorial in front of Santa Fe High School on May 22, 2018 in Santa Fe, Texas. The makeshift memorial honors the victims of last Friday's shooting when 17-year-old student Dimitrios Pagourtzis entered the school with a shotgun and a pistol and opened fire, killing 10 people. (Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images)
'Like Talking to a Toddler': Mother of School Shooting Victim Reveals How It Felt to Discuss Gun Policy With Trump
"In a normal presidency, this would be big/headline news, but with Trump, even for his supporters, such behavior is taken for granted. Baked in. Expected even. We shrug. We move on."
Jun 01, 2018
President Donald Trump visited Texas on Thursday to meet privately with families who lost loved ones in last month's Santa Fe high school shooting, and at least one parent came away profoundly unimpressed by the commander-in-chief's behavior.
"It was like talking to a toddler," said Rhonda Hart, an Army veteran whose 14-year-old daughter Kimberly Vaughan was killed in the shooting, which left eight students and two teachers dead. "He kept calling [the shooter] this wacky kid who was wearing a wacky trench coat."
After Trump continued to use the word "wacky" to describe the shooter--who was identified shortly after the massacre as 17-year-old student Dimitrios Pagourtzis--Hart recounted that she told the president "he might have been depressed, but he wasn't wacky."
"If that kid needed help, he needed to have proper access to it," Hart said in an interview with People. "I said all that and [Trump] didn't say anything. He was just like, 'Uhhhh ...'"
According to Hart, Trump also "kept mentioning" his plan to arm teachers, which has been widely denounced by educators themselves.
When Hart suggested having veterans serve as "sentinels" in schools, Trump reportedly responded, "And arm them?"
"No," Hart said.
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President Donald Trump visited Texas on Thursday to meet privately with families who lost loved ones in last month's Santa Fe high school shooting, and at least one parent came away profoundly unimpressed by the commander-in-chief's behavior.
"It was like talking to a toddler," said Rhonda Hart, an Army veteran whose 14-year-old daughter Kimberly Vaughan was killed in the shooting, which left eight students and two teachers dead. "He kept calling [the shooter] this wacky kid who was wearing a wacky trench coat."
After Trump continued to use the word "wacky" to describe the shooter--who was identified shortly after the massacre as 17-year-old student Dimitrios Pagourtzis--Hart recounted that she told the president "he might have been depressed, but he wasn't wacky."
"If that kid needed help, he needed to have proper access to it," Hart said in an interview with People. "I said all that and [Trump] didn't say anything. He was just like, 'Uhhhh ...'"
According to Hart, Trump also "kept mentioning" his plan to arm teachers, which has been widely denounced by educators themselves.
When Hart suggested having veterans serve as "sentinels" in schools, Trump reportedly responded, "And arm them?"
"No," Hart said.
President Donald Trump visited Texas on Thursday to meet privately with families who lost loved ones in last month's Santa Fe high school shooting, and at least one parent came away profoundly unimpressed by the commander-in-chief's behavior.
"It was like talking to a toddler," said Rhonda Hart, an Army veteran whose 14-year-old daughter Kimberly Vaughan was killed in the shooting, which left eight students and two teachers dead. "He kept calling [the shooter] this wacky kid who was wearing a wacky trench coat."
After Trump continued to use the word "wacky" to describe the shooter--who was identified shortly after the massacre as 17-year-old student Dimitrios Pagourtzis--Hart recounted that she told the president "he might have been depressed, but he wasn't wacky."
"If that kid needed help, he needed to have proper access to it," Hart said in an interview with People. "I said all that and [Trump] didn't say anything. He was just like, 'Uhhhh ...'"
According to Hart, Trump also "kept mentioning" his plan to arm teachers, which has been widely denounced by educators themselves.
When Hart suggested having veterans serve as "sentinels" in schools, Trump reportedly responded, "And arm them?"
"No," Hart said.
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