Investigation continues into Oregon elementary school shooting

And thanks for joining us as we cap off another busy week of all things people, power, and politics. This, my friends, is The Pulse. I'm Rupert Raj. Campaign season is truly ramping up, just 18 days until the election. I had the chance to sit down with Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers one-on-one and Democratic Secretary of State candidate Garland Gilchrist. And in case you missed it, you'll also hear from Vice President Vance, who is in town, stumping for Rogers and other Republicans on the ballot. We're also diving into the trade war, but from a different angle tonight. a story in The Economist talking about how Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is showing the world how to stand up to President Trump. We're going to be taking a closer look at that and how it could hurt Michigan. And we're also diving into the investigation into that horrific school shooting in Bend, Oregon. Three children and a teacher killed by a teenager. The question of why still remains tonight. Former Detroit Police Chief Ralph Godbey and Attorney Eli Mouad look at how things could play out from here. And that tragedy in Oregon is where we begin tonight as the investigation does play out. Memorials are being placed outside the Silver Rail Elementary in Bend, Oregon, close to 130 miles east of Eugene. The children, just 5, 8, and 11 years old, as well as a teacher, all shot and killed. Another 7-year-old and a 54-year-old teacher critically hurt at the hospital. Tonight, we're learning the 16-year-old gunman was a student at the school and before a bystander shot and killed him a teacher threw her phone at the gunman tackled him and fought with him likely saving even more lives all of this as parents grapple with this tragedy grateful that my daughter is is home and safe with us after attending school yesterday my day yesterday was unreal it didn't feel real it didn't feel like it could be happening here at our school and it was extremely painful and it's hard to understand it we can't understand it and we're trying to grieve and process and recover according to the Gun Violence Archive which tracks shootings in the United States this was the 371st mass shooting in the United States this year a conversation about how the investigation is moving forward how it could play out starts in less than 10 minutes. And there's really no good way to transition from a story like that. But we do need to run you through some of the other big stories we're on top of in the world of politics right now. We'll begin right here at the White House where Press Secretary Katie Zachariah is out after fewer than seven days on the job. She's faced questions about her professional background and was criticized for a lack of polish when taking questions from journalists. President Trump said today he'd talk with her this weekend and that if he were her then he'd reconsider the job but he added he felt she was treated unfairly by the media Zakaria was also criticized for calling herself a lawyer when she never passed the bar she is expected to continue a role at the White House though it's not clear what role that will be to Houston now where an officer who's an ICE officer rammed his vehicle into a Houston construction worker and broke his leg while pursuing him that man's family today speaking and claiming the man they tried to track down chasing died years ago. The incident happened yet Saturday. ICE said they saw the suspect they were chasing enter a car with the man who was injured, but the district attorney's office says that suspect wasn't even in the car. And an advocacy group says the real suspect's family shared documents proving his death. ICE declined to comment. The 48-year-old man is hospitalized with multiple leg fractures and needs reconstructive ankle surgery. All right, to the midterms now, where Democratic Secretary of State candidate Garland Gilchrist and Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers join me on stage at the Chaldean American Chamber of Commerce. It's part of a yearly luncheon the group puts on. We'll start with Rogers, where I asked him about his claims that his opponent, Abdul Al-Sayed, has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Take a look at what he had to say. Bridge, Detroit, came out with kind of a fact check on that and said, wait a minute here. And you can't draw a direct line between Abdul El-Sayed and the Muslim Brotherhood. You talk about his half-sister, his biological mom who didn't raise him. Yet here we are talking about all these things, and we're not talking about the things that matter to people right now. Do you think that you should be producing more facts maybe about these alleged ties to the Muslim Brotherhood that you've made these allegations about? Well, we have all of the facts. I would just wish the press would do their work and investigate the facts. We have volumes of it. Where are you getting the data from, sir? All over. You can do your own open source resource. We also took up another hot topic in this year's election with Lieutenant Governor Garland Gilchrist. Data centers. He has spoken against them, accusing the tech companies of bullying smaller communities. But he's serving under Governor Gretchen Whitmer, who, as you know, has championed multiple projects. I asked him about that during our one-on-one conversation. Take a listen. What we have seen is some of the biggest, richest, most powerful companies on the planet go to some of the smallest communities in the state of Michigan and punk them into taking these projects. That's what's happened in places like Saline Township, where you had a situation where a community was presented with a plan from a set of companies, three of the biggest, most powerful companies in this country on the planet, and that community rejected it. but after rejecting that plan rather than trying to come up with a better one they sued them and when you are in a small township in the state of michigan it's hard to beat the biggest companies on the planet in court and so they had to settle that lawsuit and the terms of the settlement was eat this data center that you told us you didn't want several months ago i think that bullying is what underlies any of the other concerns that exist about that project or projects like it Well, Lieutenant Governor, some would argue that who abetted that bullying was the governor, your boss, by standing shoulder to shoulder with Sam Altman with a big American flag, smiling ear to ear in front of this data center that you're actually pointing out wasn't wanted in that community. Does that bother you, to work for someone who stood shoulder to shoulder with Sam Altman just pushing this forward? You saw, I wasn't at the groundbreaking. You know, I think it's important to make clear that, you know, look, I stand against projects and that kind of bullying, and that's what that represented, so that's why I didn't support it. That was a lot of ground that we covered with both of these candidates. We did 25 minutes with Mike Rogers and 25 minutes with Carolyn Gilchrist, all topics that have a lot to do with our pocketbook. So if you want, you can actually watch those conversations. Just scan the code at the bottom of your screen there. It'll take you to Fox2Detroit.com and the Fox Local app where you can watch the whole thing. And in case you missed it, Vice President J.D. Vance rallied for Republicans up and down the ballot yesterday. He was at the Level Up Training Complex in Monroe along with Senate candidate Mike Rogers. Congresswoman Lisa McClain and Congressman Mike Rogers coming together for this important visit for them. It comes ahead of former President Barack Obama, who's visiting. He's going to be rallying for Democrats next week, along with President Trump, who will be here the day after stumping for Republicans. We say Michigan's at the center of the political universe. We mean it. The race between Rogers and Abdul Al-Sayed has the whole country talking. And Vance underscored that by saying this race and the midterms as a whole go way beyond politics. It is a battle between those who loathe the United States of America and those who love it, a battle between grievance and gratitude, between politicians obsessed with foreign causes and leaders who remember that their first duty is to fight for the people right here at home. And I hate to say it, that Michigan has become ground zero in that battle. Former President Obama is in town a week from tomorrow. President Trump, again, will be in St. Clair County the day after. We're turning back to the Oregon school shooting after the break. The investigation is well underway, and the grieving does, of course, continue. As that happens, former Detroit Police Chief Al Godby and Attorney Eli Muad discuss how this all could play out next. You're watching The Pulse on Fox 2. Back now on The Pulse, looking at all things people, power, and politics. Here to talk about the investigation into the Oregon school shooting, former Detroit Police Chief Al Godby and Attorney Eli Muad. Good to see you both, and I'm sorry it's under these circumstances. Look, this is about policy, it's about the law, it's about where we're going as a country and how we allow this to keep happening. And so we'll begin with you, Chief, former Chief Al Godby here with us here tonight. What do you make of this? You can't harden up a school so that it looks like a jail. Right. But you also want to make sure that someone like this 16-year-old who's a former student doesn't come ramming in and apparently shooting at the locks in the school. You know, it's unfathomable what the mind can conceive and how evil some of the outcomes can be. And unfortunately, there's no 100% way to prevent things like this. But you can harden a target. And I think we have to swallow hard as a country. I mean, Bend, Oregon is just such a beautiful community. So many people have moved there to kind of escape what's perceived to be violent urban areas. And maybe they let their guard down a little bit, not specifically this school. Sure. But I think there's a false sense of security in areas like that. And we really have to be vigilant in how we construct our buildings. These things don't happen in urban areas because they're so reinforced and the infrastructure is such that it's difficult to get a gun into an urban school. That's interesting. So the urban schools, it's tougher to do in the suburban schools. It's easier to do, it seems. And we should mention that, of course, we're talking about three elementary school students and one teacher who died, two others injured. Eli, take us into what's next with the legal battle around this. You have a 16-year-old who's a former student, obviously a juvenile, but yet nonetheless with such a horrific crime. Well, it's kind of going to be the Oxford shooting where you want to see how this person got the weapon. All right. Was it legal? Was it illegal? And then you're going to look at who he was living with. Was there something where there was gross negligence as to how this person may have gotten the weapon? You've got to study that and learn that. Also, because he has passed away, the shooter, he died, right? you're going to have to look into some of his social media and all of his background the chief will tell you that's kind of standard policy here just determine um exactly what his thoughts were what the target why that why he targeted it but i i do agree with what you said and what you said the locks yes these schools throughout the country right now better be looking at their door locks because if somebody can get through with a gun and and open those doors by by shooting the doors you got we have issues but a long gun is is especially powerful right when it comes to shooting out locks it is but to Eli's point and i think we can do it the technology is there but is the will to do it because if you look at the frequency of um school shootings or mass shootings uh it's low on the frequency but the devastation that is caused uh you can't do that at an airport. Because we made a conscious decision as a country that to pierce that veil, there are a number of layers that you have to go through and you don't have those kind of incidents. We've got to decide, are we going to make the investment in the infrastructure of schools, whether it be urban, suburban, rural, or big city? And understand that it can happen anywhere. And you have to make sure that you harden the target enough to where it makes it much more difficult. You make a good point. I mean, if you go to an airport, you don't feel as though you're walking into a jail. You feel like you're walking into a safe area when you cross the TSA lines. And you're saying urban schools may have more security with the metal detectors and whatnot. They don't feel like jails. They feel like safe zones when you go through that. Well, I was chief at Detroit Public Schools most recently before retiring to go into ministry full time. And that was the last, unfortunately, of our worries. Things that may have happened on the exterior of the campus. But once those children got inside the school, we were fairly sure that it was a pristine area relative to guns or knives or things of that nature. Mom and dad out there, I don't know the parental situation necessarily. I know investigators continue to look into this situation at Bend. When you look at the Oxford school shooting, the precedents it set, when we talk about the legal issues around this for the 16-year-old's parents, take us through what could happen in different scenarios. Okay, so you have to see what they knew about his mental health or if they knew about his issues that are bothering him. If they knew that and, you know, they had a weapon laying around or they knew that he was, you know, maybe he was threatening certain people. If they had knowledge, a little bit like the Oxford shooting, then the parents could have some culpability. And you're seeing more of these investigations go towards the guardians or the parents or where the person is living. So, yes, there could be, after an investigation, criminal charges if it's shown to be gross negligent in how they handled the situation. Yeah, you talk about moms and dads providing weapons to kids either as a gift, as you've heard before, of course, in the Oxford school shooting case. In this case, obviously, they're going to be taking a close look at that, right? Yeah, the mother purchased a weapon in Oregon, I think at 16, you can purchase the weapon and the young person can possess it if they're in a targeting situation where they're shooting a gun, if they're in a hunting situation. But I do think there is a possibility of some vicarious liability from the parents depending on what they knew how this weapon was secured or not. So I think, cuz the mother was interviewed, and tragic for her, she lost a child as well. But she was very circumspect in how she answered the media's questions, because I'm sure she understands that there's potential liability that may lie with her. When we talk about, for instance, the parking lots, because this person apparently came into the parking lot, and there was somewhat of a battle there, there was another battle inside the classroom. But that, minutes count when you first enter the premise of the school. Talk for a moment about that. Well, the thing is the average mass shooting happens within three to five minutes. So regardless of how quickly the police responded, more often than not, the damage is done. Fortunately there was a civilian there, there was a teacher as well that took some very definitive action. We learn post Columbine how you must do what you can to disarm or even eliminate the shooter. So that was done by the book. And unfortunately, horrific history has taught us how to address those situations to where it's not just the police response to the shooter, but it's everyone that could possibly be harmed. Those were two heroes. And Eli, you're an attorney and you're on the show for that reason. You're also a dad whose kids grew up during the era of all of this. Of course, Columbine was in the late 90s, and then you have everything that's transpired since. What's that been like, and what do you think parents are dealing with now that they didn't have to deal with even 20 years ago? Well, that's exactly what they have to deal with every day when they send their kids off to school. I remember when my kids were in high school, there was a potential threat, and a ton of police officers rushed that area. I got a hold of the tried to call the school I tried to figure out what's going on but then after about maybe half an hour it was noted that the threat there was no threat false alarm etc but as a parent you definitely definitely a lot of emotions go through your head when you hear that attorney and a parent you're also a former police chief but also a grandfather and a grandfather you know I picked my daughter up my granddaughter up from flakes elementary school and as I stood in Lining to wait to get her, I welled up. And when she came out, I hugged her real tight, just thinking about what happened just the day before in Portland, in Bend, Oregon. And I know that as a pastor on Sunday and as you do every week, lots of prayers going out to these families and the entire community. Absolutely, yes. Thank you so much, Ralph Godbey, Eli Mouad. Good to see you both. Thank you. And with that, we're all thinking about Bend, Oregon tonight. We'll be right back. It is people, power, and politics. Welcome back to The Pulse, Detroit's only net-lead political talk show. Here to dive into the trade war between the U.S. and Canada from a really different angle, Dan Casey with Panic Proof Retirement. It's interesting, The Economist with this new report that indicated that it seems, though, Canada is one of the first countries to push back in the way they are against the trade war against them. Talk about that. Yeah, and specifically the battleground states, right, Michigan and Pennsylvania and Ohio. And so they know what they're doing, obviously. and they're doing it on purpose, and they're taking Michigan's pain as leverage, using it for Washington, right? So yeah, he's ramped things up. He's now backing down. Hopefully, after the midterms, he hopefully will come back to the table and at least try to negotiate a little bit, because the pain is real. We're all feeling it. Not only in the automotive industry, car prices are up somewhere between $1,300 to $2,300 per car, and it's so hard to figure that out because it's going back and forth, back and forth over the borders. But not only automobiles, but farming. Wheat is down 87% since 2024. Cherry exports is down 62%. So we're all feeling it, and we're hoping it'll end soon. It's interesting because before it ends, of course, we have the elections, as you mentioned, that are coming up. And today, I had the chance to talk with Mike Rogers, who is doubling down on the reason why he's saying, look, we got to stop this trade war now with Canada. Although he didn't recognize there's an uneven trade sheet balance with Canada. Talk for a moment about that. Yeah, and that's what started this in July, right? So Trump was clear when he said he didn't like when Canada would put automobile quotas on. They have a very strict tariff rule in their dairy section. So our dairy farmers have a very hard time getting into Canada. What does that mean for prices and for what's happening when we do business with Canada? Yeah, so higher prices now. And it's harder for our farmers and things to sell the products because they can't get into Canada. And 40% of everything that Michigan sells outside the Michigan borders is going to Canada. So it's a major trading partner. So when they started doing it, and lumber too, lumber has been going back to the 80s that we've had issues with that. So the issues were real, it's just hopefully the end result isn't worse than what we started with. Cuz Carney's already, he's in the middle of a trade negotiation with India, right? He's going to start building next year a pipeline to get some of this oil through Alberta through over to their west coast so they can start shipping it overseas and they're not so reliant on us because we're buying a lot of it. So in the meantime, all this trade war does continue, the stalemate between Canada and the US continues. You're saying that other countries, including the eastern countries and some western countries are saying, hmm, let's get in on the game here with Canada. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, he doesn't want to be so reliant on us for this very reason, or at least or Or at least sending the message, right, to the current administration that they're not gonna back down. So, and you know, Carney, just a few years ago, nobody could pick him out of a lineup. But now he's got a 70% approval rate. So apparently the Canadians are backing him. The problem I think the headwinds are, Canada's got a 6.7% unemployment rate and ours is 4.1. And as it progresses and as it gets worse, maybe there'll be some wiggle room. I was going to say, the cost for Canada for putting up a fight doesn't come without consequence. Yes, exactly. Yeah, and it's definitely going to add up. And the elephant in the room is, of course, oil. No one's talking about adding tariffs to oil because, again, we need their oil. We only have the light crude here in the States, so we ship a lot of that out because it's good for plastics and things. But our refineries need the heavy crude, and they've got it. And so does Venezuela, so. One of the biggest things that comes out of Canada that's one of the most useful things is the fertilizer. And right now there's a protection around, I think it's called potash or potash. Yes, yes. And so that particular potassium and whatever else is in there is being protected. It's exempt from this particular tariff, right? Yeah, yeah. But if that changes, that's really going to hit farmers hard. Yes, and that's the big one. And again, we talked about a little bit with the Strait of Hormuz when that was, because we get a lot of that stuff over there, too. So yeah, that's not good. And of course, when January 1st hits, when that's the big tariff that President Trump said it's going to start going on, automobile parts, that could be ugly. So I'm pretty sure that he's going to be, Carney's going to be coming to the negotiation table pretty soon. Also, perhaps at the table, you have the heads of Ford, Stellantis, and General Motors. After January, do you think you'll see them perhaps make trips to the White House, as they have in the past, to have discussions with President Trump about how it's affecting their bottom lines? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think they all will. I think, again, after this midterm election's over, I think everybody's going to be coming to the table and trying to negotiate a little bit more. One more question. Yeah, I guess it's critically important. One more question, though, kind of zooming out and looking at the Strait of Hormuz. You know, you read a lot, and I've talked to a lot of people who are economists and business folks who say that they're finding other routes and other passages for oil to come in. Is the Strait of Hormuz as important as it was, let's say, three months ago? It still is. There's no quick answer to fix this. So unfortunately, it still is. And we are trying to get oil from other ways. Venezuela, yes, for one of them. So that was obviously a reason for that. So yeah, it just takes too long to do something like that. So the quick answer is we've got to get the war over and we've got to get that trade open. Well, I think everybody agrees. You've heard the one thing that Mike Rogers and Abdul El-Sayed perhaps do agree on is that the war needs to end as of yesterday, as they both have said. Yes. Dan Casey with Panic Proof Retirement. Great to see you. Thanks for joining us here tonight. Thanks, sir. That is the Pulse for tonight. Thank you so much for joining us. I'm Rupert Raj. As always, it was good to be with you. Have a good weekend.