President Biden to meet with Buffalo shooting victims’ families, first responders
New cell phone video obtained exclusively by ABC News shows suspect Peyton Gendron being taken into police custody moments after the shooting.
Police say they’re digging into his digital footprint and determining how long this attack had been planned, already revealing he previously visited Buffalo in March.
RELATED | Suspect asked to leave Buffalo supermarket day before shooting
A total of 13 people were shot, 10 people killed, nearly all of them Black.
They include 86-year-old Ruth Whitfield who was shopping in the store after visiting her husband of 68 years in his nursing home.
Her cousin lives in Teaneck, New Jersey.
“Think about how you want your family to be treated. Black, white, Chinese, Hispanic, it doesn’t matter, we’re all people,” said Carolyn Mitchell, the victim’s cousin. “And God created us, and we all deserve to live our lives until God sees fit to take us away.”
RELATED | Hero security guard, shoppers among Buffalo shooting victims
First Lady Jill Biden will join the president for the visit, where their first stop will be a makeshift memorial outside the supermarket. They’re also expected to meet privately with families of the victims, first responders and local officials before the president delivers public remarks.
In a speech at a nearby community center, Biden plans to call for stricter gun laws and urge Americans to reject racism and embrace the nation’s diversity, the White House said.
It’s a message that Biden has delivered several times since he became the first president to specifically address white supremacy in an inaugural speech, calling it “domestic terrorism that we must confront.” However, such beliefs remain an entrenched threat at a time when his administration has been preoccupied with crises involving the pandemic, inflation and the war in Ukraine.
“It’s important for him to show up for the families and the community and express his condolences,” said Derrick Johnson, the president of the NAACP. “But we’re more concerned with preventing this from happening in the future.”
The White House said the president and first lady will “grieve with the community that lost 10 lives in a senseless and horrific mass shooting.” Three more people were wounded. Nearly all the victims were Black.
Biden was briefed about the shooting by his homeland security adviser, Liz Sherwood-Randall, before he attended church services on Saturday near his family home in Wilmington, Delaware, according to the White House. She called again later to tell him that law enforcement had concluded the attack was racially motivated.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, told a Buffalo radio station that she invited Biden to the city.
“I said, ‘Mr. President, it would be so powerful if you came here,'” Hochul said. “‘This community is in such pain, and to see the president of the United States show them the attention that Buffalo doesn’t always get.'”
On Monday, Biden paid particular tribute to one of the victims, retired police officer Aaron Salter, who was working as a security guard at the store. He said Salter “gave his life trying to save others” by opening fire at the gunman, only to be killed himself.
WATCH | ABC News Special Report on Buffalo shooting
(The Associated Press contributed to this report)
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