A Hollywood actor with roots in the South Texas city that was the scene of a horrific school shooting last month made a call for gun legislation at the White House on Tuesday (June 7), according to an Associated Press report that was ran by San Antonio CBS affiliate KENS.
For 22 minutes, per the report, Matthew McConaughey touched on subjects such as how he learned to responsibly handle a firearm as a kid growing up in Uvalde and the visits he and his wife, Camila Alves, made to his hometown to be with those impacted by the tragedy at Robb Elementary School.
An 18-year-old gunman opened fire at the school and killed 21 people, including 19 students. Law enforcement officials ultimately shot the suspect to death.
Much of McConaughey's speech was about the young victims, the AP reported.
“They want to make their loss of life matter,” McConaughey said, referring to the grief-stricken parents, according to the report.
The 52-year-old actor, who became a household name through the 1993 film "Dazed and Confused," then urged lawmakers to take action on firearms, acknowledging that laws alone won't stop events like Uvalde, per the AP.
“We want secure and safe schools and we want gun laws that won’t make it so easy for the bad guys to get the damn guns,” he said in the report. "We need to invest in mental health care. We need safer schools. We need to restrain sensationalized media coverage. We need to restore our family values. We need to restore our American values and we need responsible gun ownership.”
Back in Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott has tabbed the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training (ALERRT) Center at Texas State University in San Marcos to provide active shooter training to the state's public school districts, Austin Journal reported.
A release issued by the governor's office said that Abbott, a Republican, wrote a letter to Dr. Pete Blair, ALERRT's executive director, to initiate programs with a strong emphasis on school-based law enforcement.