EL PASO, Texas — President Trump offered a gentler version of his presidency to survivors of the El Paso shooting during his visit to the Texas city, according to a baseball coach who heroically raced to the scene to save lives.
“One of the children went up to hug him so he got down on one knee to let him,” said Jimmy Villatoro, who described meeting the president at the city’s University Medical Center, where many of the wounded were treated.
“It was a different side of him, one that you don’t see in public,” Villatoro said in an interview with the Washington Examiner.
Trump’s visit was mired in controversy. His anti-immigrant rhetoric was blamed by some opponents for inciting the rampage that left 22 people dead on Saturday.
Hundreds of people joined a protest timed to coincide with the president’s arrival.
And Trump did not disappoint his critics with a public string of comments and tweets in which he derided “sleepy Joe Biden,” accused the “fake news” of distorting coverage of his visit, and slammed his hosts on an earlier leg in Dayton, Ohio, saying, “Their news conference after I left for El Paso was a fraud.”
But Villatoro said his personal touch away from the cameras was far from divisive and was welcomed by the people he met. There were no politics behind closed doors, he added.
“He made sure my family was OK, asking after my wife and son,” he said.
“We met him face to face, and he and Melania were amazing, checking we were okay, offering any kind of help, if we needed someone to talk to. We told him that Democrats, Republicans, we were all united in this city.”
Incredible afternoon in El Paso, Texas. We love you, and are with you, all the way! pic.twitter.com/pTNhHapx86
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 8, 2019
Villatoro has become something of a local celebrity as details of his heroism spread.
When a friend called in a panic on Saturday with news that his wife had been shot, he knew he needed to get to the scene. He knew there were other mothers and children outside the Walmart superstore running a lemonade stand to raise money for their soccer team.
He arrived at the same time as a friend, who ran straight to the canopy set up for the stall.
“He finds one of our coaches, Memo Garcia,” said Villatoro. “He had been shot four times. He and another coach had shielded a family so they could run.”
He ignored the sight of blood and bodies to try to find the children who had been selling lemonade. He led them to safety after they called to him from their hiding place behind a car in the parking lot.
He helped get his friend’s wounded wife, who had been shot in the leg, to an ambulance. But amid the chaos the paramedics said they could only deal with the most critically wounded so Villatoro got her to a passerby with a van who took her to hospital.
The gunman was still on the loose as Villatoro went back and forth in the parking lot accounting for the soccer team’s children and helping the wounded find transport.
He did not stop to think about his own safety, he said.
“I just wanted to get the kids out of there,” he said. “That was the most important thing. It didn’t cross my mind. When I think about it now it was a crazy thing to do but I wasn’t thinking about that then.”
