Jules Witcover, syndicated columnist

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden has quickly responded with personal empathy to the killing of 19 elementary school students and two teachers in Uvalde, Texas.

As a longstanding advocate of bipartisanship during his 36 years in the Senate, Biden has called on Congress to ban assault weapons, such as the one used by the young assailant in Uvalde, or at least to raise the age of legal ownership.

The Uvalde killer, Salvador Ramos, 18, was gunned down after about an hour according to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who described it as “a quick response,” although others declared it as inadequate. Abbott in a news conference praised “valiant local officials,” insisting, “It is a fact that because of their quick response getting on the scene, being able to respond to the gunman and eliminate the gunman, they were able to save lives.” Yet other observers on the scene complained that Uvalde police failed to eradicate the shooter sooner.

The latest gun mayhem occurred only a day before the nation’s premier gun rights group, the National Rifle Association, was scheduled to hold its annual convention in Houston, with former president Donald Trump, its most prominent champion, expected to speak amid a number of lawsuits against the NRA.

Also scheduled to address the convention were Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota. Abbott on Thursday canceled his speech in favor of visiting the Uvalde site, choosing to release recorded remarks to the convention .

Biden should seize the opportunity now to blow the whistle on the NRA, and particularly on all those Republicans who shed crocodile tears whenever another such campus killing occurs. The relative silence from the once proudly conservative Grand Old Party of Lincoln, Eisenhower and Reagan speaks loudly of its unwillingness to take sensible actions in this heartbreaking matter.

Conspicuously silent are the voices of the few remaining Republican moderates who hope to reclaim the party from from the agent of chaos Trump. Although cleanly rejected by the U.S. electorate in 2020, Trump continues to act as if his defeat in 2020 never happened, and that the election was “rigged” against him.

At the core of the Republican dysfunction is the fact that Trump has managed through skillful, shameless presumption that he still speaks for a majority of Americans despite their voting him to the sidelines in 2020.

In this regard, a hopeful sign is that fed-up party officeholders such as members of the Republican Governors Association are finally speaking out against Trump as an interloper whose place in the sun is fading.

Where, a moderate Republican might ask, is today’s John McCain when they need him?

Jules Witcover’s latest book is “The American Vice Presidency: From Irrelevance to Power,” published by Smithsonian Books. You can respond to this column at juleswitcover@comcast.net.