New gun drama in the United States. Six people including three children were killed in a shooting that took place at a private school in Nashville on Monday. Local police chief John Drake initially identified the shooter as Audrey Hale, a 28-year-old woman who was shot during the police response. At the end of the day, his services specified that he was a transgender man, born a woman but who identified himself as a man on LinkedIn under the first name Aiden.
Police say Hale, who attended The Covenant, a private Protestant school with about 200 students and about 40 staff, was heavily armed with two assault rifles and a pistol. After crossing the ground floor, he headed for the first floor firing numerous shots. Three students, aged 8 to 9, and three adults, aged 60 to 61, were killed by his bullets, including the school’s director, Katherine Koonce. It was a “targeted” attack, said John Drake, with a manifesto and plans of the establishment found
“Tragic situation”
Three patients were treated by pediatric wards at Vanderbilt University Medical Center with gunshot wounds and pronounced dead on arrival, hospital spokesman John Howser said. Three adults also died, he added.
Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee tweeted that he was monitoring this “tragic situation,” calling on America to “pray for the school, congregation, and community of Nashville.”
“That’s enough, President Biden is once again asking Congress to act,” said White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre. Gun violence is tearing at “the very soul” of the United States, Biden added. In his State of the Union address, Joe Biden argued for a ban on semi-automatic assault rifles like in the 1990s. But it would take the support of the Republican-controlled House and 60 senators out of 100, an impossible threshold to reach in a Congress more divided than ever.