Federal review of Uvalde shooting finds Border Patrol missteps but does not recommend discipline
A federal report says U.S. Border Patrol agents who rushed to the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, in May 2022, were insufficiently trained and failed to establish command at the scene, but they violated no rules
U.S. Border Patrol agents who rushed to the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, in 2022 failed to establish command and had inadequate training to confront what became one of the nation’s deadliest classroom attacks, according to a federal report released Thursday. But investigators concluded the agents did not violate rules and no disciplinary action was recommended.
The roughly 200-page report from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Office of Professional Responsibility does not assign overarching blame for the hesitant police response at Robb Elementary School, where a teenage gunman with an AR-style rifle killed 19 students and two teachers inside a fourth-grade classroom. Nearly 200 U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers were involved in the response, more than any other law enforcement agency.
The gunman was inside the classroom for more than 70 minutes before a tactical team, led by Border Patrol, went inside and killed the shooter.
Much of the report — which the agency says was initiated to “provide transparency and accountability” — retells the chaos, confusion and numerous police missteps that other scathing government reports have already laid bare. Some victims' family members bristled over federal investigators identifying no one deserving of discipline.
