UVALDE (US), May 30 — Desperate pleas for a stop to the gun massacres plaguing the United States rang out yesterday during President Joe Biden’s visit to Uvalde, where he prayed for the 19 children and two teachers slain by a teen gunman in the small Texas town.

"Do something!” rang out shouts from a crowd in the street as Biden left Sacred Heart church where he attended Mass with mourning relatives.

"We will. We will,” Biden responded to the crowd, before heading to private meetings with relatives of the dead and with first responders.

Biden, accompanied by his wife, Jill Biden, was in Uvalde less than two weeks after making a similar trip to the site of another mass shooting — this time targeting African Americans in a racist attack — in Buffalo, New York.

The first couple began by visiting a makeshift shrine at Robb Elementary School, where last Tuesday the teen gunman walked in with an AR-15-type semi-automatic and began his slaughter.

"We need changes,” shouted one man.

"Our hearts are broken,” Archbishop Gustavo Garcia-Siller said at the church.

Biden was not scheduled to speak publicly in Texas, but on Saturday he renewed his so-far fruitless call for Congress to overcome years of paralysis to toughen firearms regulations — especially on weapons like the AR-15.

"We cannot outlaw tragedy, I know, but we can make America safer,” Biden said.

Justice Department probes police

Harrowing accounts emerged of the ordeal faced by survivors of Tuesday’s attack, where the behaviour of the police is under severe scrutiny.

Ten-year-old Samuel Salinas was sitting in his fourth-grade classroom when the shooter, later identified as Salvador Ramos, 18, barged in and announced: "You’re all going to die.” Then "he just started shooting,” Salinas told ABC News.

Texas authorities admitted Friday that as many as 19 police officers were in the school hallway for nearly an hour before finally breaching the room and killing Ramos, saying the officers mistakenly thought that he had stopped killing and was now barricaded.

Parents have expressed fury and yesterday the Justice Department announced an inquiry "to identify lessons learned and best practices to help first responders prepare.” Surviving children describe making desperate, whispered pleas for help in 911 phone calls while police waited.

Some played dead to avoid drawing the shooter’s attention. Eleven-year-old Miah Cerrillo smeared the blood of a dead friend on herself to feign death.

Salinas said he thinks Ramos fired at him, but the bullet struck a chair, sending shrapnel into the boy’s leg. "I played dead so he wouldn’t shoot me,” he said.

Another student, Daniel, whose mother would not provide his last name, said he saw Ramos fire through the glass in the classroom door, striking his teacher.

Though his teacher lay on the floor bleeding, she repeatedly told the students, "‘Stay calm. Stay where you are. Don’t move,’” Daniel told The Washington Post.

‘Have the courage’

Vice President Kamala Harris on Saturday attended the funeral of a victim of the Buffalo mass shooting — Ruth Whitfield, who was among 10 people killed on May 14, allegedly by a self-described white supremacist.

"Congress must have the courage to stand up, once and for all, to the gun lobby and pass reasonable gun safety laws,” Harris tweeted.

The Uvalde shooting was the deadliest school attack since 20 children and six staff were killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut in 2012.

But despite the epidemic of mass shootings and ever growing flood of private gun purchases, Congress has repeatedly failed to agree on possible new regulations.

This time might be different, some lawmakers say.

Democratic Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy said yesterday there were "serious negotiations” underway involving members of both parties.

In Uvalde, Robert Robles, 73, said he was glad Biden had visited to show concern but said the president needs to pass laws restricting powerful military style rifles, like the AR-15, and "protect these kids.” — AFP