Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Broward County, FL Sheriff Scott Israel fielded questions from show host Jake Tapper about his department’s actions leading up to and during the Parkland school shooting.
Israel said he had provided “amazing leadership” as the head of that agency.
Partial transcript as follows:
TAPPER: Are you really not taking any responsibility for the multiple red flags that were brought to the attention of the Broward Sheriff’s office about this shooter before this incident, whether it was people near him, close to him calling the police?
ISRAEL: I can only take responsibility for what I knew about. I exercised my due diligence. I’ve given amazing leadership to this agency.
TAPPER: Amazing leadership?
ISRAEL: Yes, Jake. There’s a lot of things we’ve done throughout this — this is — you don’t measure a person’s leadership by a deputy not going in to — these deputies received the training they needed.
TAPPER: Maybe you measure somebody’s leadership by whether or not they protect the community. You’ve listed 23 incidents before the shooting involving the shooter, and still, nothing was done to keep guns out of his hands, to make sure that the school was protected, to make sure you were keeping an eye on him — I don’t understand how you can sit there and claim amazing leadership?
ISRAEL: Jake, on 16 of those cases our deputies did everything right. Our deputies have done amazing things. We’ve taken this — the five years I’ve been sheriff, we’ve taken the Broward Sheriff’s Office to a new level. I’ve worked with some of the bravest people I’ve ever met. One person at this point, one person didn’t do what he should have done. It’s horrific. The victims here — the families, I pray for them every night. it makes me sick to my stomach that we had a deputy that didn’t go in because I know if I was there if I was on the wall, I would have been the first in along with so many of the other people.
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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