Uvalde, Tx., school police chief Pete Arredondo will not be sworn in as a newly elected Uvalde City Council member as planned on Tuesday, reports the Austin American Statesman. Arredondo was elected on May 7 and was slated to take the oath of office during a special meeting on Tuesday. Mayor Don McLaughlin said that will not happen. “Our focus on Tuesday is on our families who lost loved ones," McLaughlin said. "We begin burying our children tomorrow, the innocent victims of last week’s murders at Robb Elementary School."
Arredondo led the law enforcement response to the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School and prevented officers from confronting the gunman for more than an hour, raising questions about whether lives could have been saved. Nineteen students and two teachers were killed.
It was not clear if Arredondo would be sworn in at a later time, or if it could be done privately. He was one of three council members scheduled to be sworn in Tuesday. The Texas Rangers have intensified an examination of the police response to the shooting and the U.S. Justice Department conducting a review of police actions, at the request of McLaughlin. “I trust the assessment will be fair, transparent, and independent,” McLaughlin said. “The victims' families deserve answers, and the truth will be told." Arredondo, 50, who grew up in Uvalde and graduated from high school there, has spent much of a nearly 30-year career in law enforcement in Uvalde, taking the school district job in 2020. At candidates’ forum before his council election, Arredondo said: “I guess to me nothing is complicated. Everything has a solution. That solution starts with communication. Communication is key.”