UVALDE, Texas — A new Washington Post article is spotlighting the damage AR-15 rifles can do, partly by showing graphic images taken from scenes of some of the worse mass shootings in the country's history.
That includes last year's Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, the 2017 church shooting in Sutherland Springs, and the Las Vegas music festival massacre that same year.
The first few shots focus on scenes riddled with bullet holes. Later in the Post's report, images show blood across a classroom floor in Uvalde.
Brett Cross, a Uvalde father who lost his son, Uziyah Garcia, in the shooting, told KENS 5 the images are a "gut punch."
But he still hopes the public will see it.
"This is what we live with daily. That gut punch you get when you see a picture of of bloody marks (left over) from a child being pulled out of a room, that's what we live with," Cross said. "When you feel that, that's just an ounce (of what we feel). I hope that gets somebody up out of their seat to start demanding a change."
Cross said he worries the American public has become so desensitized to the shootings that there is no longer a call for changes. The horrifying pictures and accounts in the article show the damage AR-15 rifles can do in a way that is often censored in media.
"It's real, and it's serious, and it's heartbreaking," Cross said. "Children are being slaughtered with these weapons. News coverage isn't working by just saying the names."
Texas Sen. Roland Gutierrez, a Democrat who represents Uvalde and has fought for gun safety legislation constantly after the massacre, told KENS 5 he wouldn't say if releasing the photos was the right call, but he does think voters need to understand the carnage that AR-15 rifles can cause.
"Some of this imagery should be seen by people in the United State—voters. The fact is, the people in power in this state don't want to do anything to change gun violence," Gutierrez said. "If people start to see the unsanitary side of this thing, the horror of it all, maybe people will start making a change with the people representing them. The fact is, violence is killing people in this state."
Gutierrez said he has already seen hundreds of hours of footage from Uvalde, as well as statements from officers at the scene. He said people need to see the AR-15 for the weapon of war that it is.
"I saw statement after statement from cops that were afraid of the AR-15. They constantly said on video, 'He's got an AR in there!' They were afraid of that gun, and that fear kept them from going into that room," Gutierrez said. "Certainly people should be outraged that these images are out there, but they should be more outraged about a government that failed them and law enforcement that failed them."
Other Uvalde parents were not happy about the photos being released. Some parents declined to speak to KENS 5, and one posted on social media asking people to not retweet or share the photos.
Cross said he understands and respects other parents who don't want to see those images. Still, he says he hopes the released photos will inspire more people to take action.
"The images in my head and the nightmares I have are worse than this," Cross said regarding the photos. "I didn't fight for common-sense gun laws beforehand. I was one of those people that said, 'This doesn't happen here.' Then it happened here."