Video: President Barack Obama dashed to Colorado on Sunday to meet with families of those gunned down in a movie theater and to hear from state and local officials about the shooting that left 12 people dead and dozens more injured.
In the midst of a tight reelection campaign, President Obama flew to Colorado on Sunday for the second time in less than a month. It is a key battleground state that he captured four years ago and would like to hold on to this fall.
But Obama did not talk politics on either visit.
PHOTOS | A look at some of the 12 people who were slain in the July 20 shooting at Century Cinema in Aurora, Colo.
INFOGRAPHIC | A look at the charges facing James Holmes after the massacre at the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora, Colo.
At least 12 died and dozens were injured in the mass shooting at a Colorado movie theater.
Last month, the president toured damage caused by widespread wildfires near Colorado Springs. He visited with firefighters and used a 642-word address to emphasize how America “comes together” in the face of natural disasters.
On Sunday, he returned to offer more comfort two days after 12 people were killed and 58 were wounded at an Aurora movie theater in one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history. He met with the victims and their families at the University of Colorado hospital and made brief remarks to reporters.
Obama said he met with each family and “confessed to them that words are always inadequate in these types of situations.”
But, he added, “my main task was to serve as a representative of the entire country and let them know we are thinking about them this moment and will continue thinking about them every single day.”
Healer in chief is a role all presidents must play in a country without a singular religious leader, putting politics aside and striking the right tone of empathy and grace in a time of grief. Yet it is also a role fraught with political peril — a president’s actions and words will be interpreted for signs of partisanship and political gain, especially in an election year in a bitterly polarized climate.
Obama is all too familiar with the scenario, having traveled twice before to cities in the wake of mass shootings. He delivered speeches at memorial services at Fort Hood, Tex., in 2009 after 13 service members were killed, allegedly by a fellow soldier, and in Tucson in 2011 after a gunman killed six and wounded 13, including then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, outside a grocery store.
Such appearances have become expected of presidents. George W. Bush spoke at the service for the victims of the Virginia Tech shootings in 2007, and Bill Clinton spoke in Colorado after the Columbine shootings in 1999.
In Aurora, Obama did not attend a prayer vigil Sunday night outside city hall. Instead, he met with local officials before flying on to San Francisco to start a previously scheduled, three-day campaign swing.
Did Obama skip the vigil for fear of appearing too political in an election season? Officials said no, explaining that the president did not want his presence, requiring a massive security apparatus at an outdoor event with 1,000 people, to inconvenience guests and take attention away from the victims.
On ABC’s “This Week,” Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan called Obama’s visit a “wonderful gesture” and said the decision was “totally appropriate.”
The campaigns of Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney have suspended negative ads in Colorado out of respect for the grieving. Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the president’s ads would remain off the air at least one more day, and the campaign has canceled a grass-roots rally in Portland, Ore., on Tuesday.
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