El Paso unites at vigil: ‘We’re going to be strong. It’s going to take time to heal’
Thousands of people, including family members of victims, gathered at an El Paso baseball field Sunday night to commemorate the 20 people killed in Saturday’s mass shooting.
A gunman shot and killed 20 people and injured 26 others at a Walmart on Saturday, rattling the usually quiet city.
Beto O’Rourke, Mayor Dee Margo and other local leaders spoke at the vigil, which was at a park nearby the shopping center where the shooting took place.
Leaders from a half dozen churches spoke to the crowd at 7 p.m. As the sun set, residents said prayers in various languages.
Lupe Lopez was among the crowd, holding a photo of a close friend who died in the shooting.
Elsa Mendoza Marquez was a teacher in Juarez and regularly came to El Paso. On Saturday, she went to Walmart to buy school supplies for her students, Lopez said. Her husband and son waited in the car.
“She never came out,” Lopez said.
Marquez was also identified as one of the victims by Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Marcelo Ebrard, who said on Twitter that Marquez was one of the six Mexican nationals who were killed.
Lopez said the shooting has been hard for everyone in the city because the community is so close-knit.
“Somebody came from out of town just to do this to us,” she said. “We’re going to be strong. It’s just going to take time to heal. It’s hard for people living here in El Paso. It’s hard for all of us.”
A 13-year-old student from Clint Independent School District who was doing back-to-school shopping was also killed in the shooting, Georgina Perez of the Texas State Board of Education said at the vigil.
“When you return to school, talk to your students,” she said to the crowd through tears. “Comfort your teachers. Let them ask you their questions. And be there to hold their hands and hug them should they need it. And if there’s anything you need from any of us, we’ll do the back-to-school shopping for you.”
Three people who were working at Walmart during the shooting also took the stage, but did not speak. A speaker at the event introduced them as heroes.
When he addressed the crowd, Margo said he visited the hospital Sunday and met a 10-week-old baby whose parents were both killed in the shooting. He also mentioned that the suspect, Patrick Crusius, was not from El Paso.
“We have never met that kind of evil in our community,” he said. “And he came from out of town. And I do not think anyone in El Paso would have committed a crime of that nature. It is not what we are about as a community.”
Crusius lived with his grandparents in Allen while attending community college but had recently moved out, according to a statement read to reporters on Sunday.
O’Rourke also spoke at the event, saying that El Paso is one of the safest cities in America “not despite, but because we are a city of immigrants and asylum seekers and refugees.”
“That tragedy yesterday will not be allowed to define us,” he said. “Instead, we will be known forever after by the way we came together and overcame this tragedy together — as human beings first, before we are anything else.”
The identities of the shooting victims are slowly being released. They include a mother who died while shielding her son from gunfire, a veteran and well-known bus driver, a couple from Kansas, a 10-year-old girl and her father.
U.S. Rep. Will Hurd addressed the crowd as people held up candles and their phones as lights.
“El Paso, we are telling the rest of the world that if you come into our community and try to scare us, we will not cower. If you try to come into our community and spread hate, we will respond with love,” he yelled to the crowd, which cheered in response.
Multiple other vigils in the city drew crowds as well. A soccer coach and two mothers who were shot outside Walmart while raising money for the team were honored at the El Paso County Sports Park.
This story was originally published August 4, 2019 at 9:44 PM.
