One week prior to the 2024 Iowa Caucus (January 15), Republican Governor Kim Reynolds of Iowa declared that she is “unleashing full power of state government to help Perry High School, the Perry community, and Dallas County recover from this senseless tragedy.”
The state of disaster emergency proclamation which Reynolds signed is in response to the January 4th mass shooting at Perry High School which killed one student and injured seven students and staff members before the 17-year-old shooter (a student at the high school) died from a self-inflicted gunshot.
Through this proclamation, I am unleashing the full power of state government to help Perry High School, the Perry community, and Dallas County recover from this senseless tragedy. https://t.co/jkukTWyB7M
— Gov. Kim Reynolds (@IAGovernor) January 8, 2024
Reynolds’s proclamation “authorizes the use and deployment of all available state resources, supplies, equipment, and materials to continue to assist Dallas County and the Perry Community in their response to and recovery from the tragic January 4th shooting at Perry High School.” The proclamation of disaster emergency expires in 30 days, on February 7, 2024.
Note: In 2021, Governor Reynolds signed a “constitutional carry” bill which allows individuals to purchase and carry handguns without a permit. The Perry High School shooter was armed with two guns — a pump-action shotgun and a small-caliber handgun. How the shooter obtained the weapons he used in the shooting has not been revealed. (You must be 18 to buy a rifle or shotgun in Iowa.)
On January 5, the day after the shooting, the Iowa Department of Public Safety reported that the investigation is ongoing and “Once the investigation is complete, the DCI’s investigative report will be turned over to the Dallas County Attorney’s Office to determine what additional course of action, if any, should be undertaken.”
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