Read this powerful letter to Trump from the editor of the El Paso Times

(Image credit: MARK RALSTON/AFP/Getty Images)

published 7 August 2019

The El Paso Times' editor Tim Archuleta has a few things he'd like President Trump to know before his Wednesday visit.

Over the weekend, a mass shooting in an El Paso, Texas Walmart left 22 people dead just hours before another shooting killed nine in Dayton, Ohio. Trump is slated to visit both cities Wednesday, but before he gets there, Archuleta wrote an open letter to Trump emphasizing that "the violence that pierced El Paso, drawing you here today, is not of our own community."

The suspected El Paso shooter drove from Dallas to conduct "a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas," he said in what appeared to be a pre-shooting manifesto. "The hatred that came to us came from an outsider," Archuleta said in his letter, adding that "this is not the El Paso we want the world to know." He went on to describe how people from El Paso lined up to donate more blood, ice, and water than were even needed. And he praised El Paso's relationship with its sister city Juárez, Mexico, countering Trump's declaration that El Paso's proximity to the border made it "one of our nation’s most dangerous cities." It was all wrapped up inside a stunning front page that listed the names of the shootings' victims above a bold message to Trump.

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Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.

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