“At this time, two dozen people have been transported to Highland Park Hospital. Six have been confirmed dead,” Commander Chris O’Neil of the city’s police told reporters.
The suspect, described by police as a white male between the ages of 18 and 20, escaped and is considered “armed and dangerous.”
“We still urge all people to shelter where they are right now,” he added.
Highland Park Mayor Nancy Rotering condemned the violence.
“On a day when we come together to celebrate community and freedom, we are mourning the tragic loss of life and fighting the terror it brought us,” he said.
Both O’Neill and Rotering said the shooting started around 10:14 am (1514 GMT).
Various law enforcement agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, state police and local police, are collaborating in the response to the attack.
Fourth of July celebrations have been called off both in Highland Park and in nearby Evanston Township.
While there is no known threat to Evanston residents, the shooter is still at large, so the cancellations are made out of an abundance of caution.
– Panic –
The shots sowed panic in the streets of Highland Park, a wealthy town on the shores of Lake Michigan, where hundreds of people had gathered in the morning for the July 4 celebrations.
Brad Schneider, an Illinois representative in the lower house of Congress, was there when the shots rang out.
“My campaign team and I had just gathered for the start of the parade when the shooting started,” Schneider tweeted after taking cover.
Later, on the same social network, he noted: “I hear about the loss of life and other injuries. My condolences to the families and loved ones; My prayers for the injured and for my community.”
The shooting came amid a wave of gun violence sweeping the United States, where an estimated 40,000 people are killed annually by firearms, including suicide, according to the Gun Violence Archive website.
The debate over gun control, a deeply divisive issue in the country, reignited after two massacres in May in which 10 African-Americans were shot at an upstate New York supermarket and 21 people, 19 of them children, were killed. murdered in an elementary school in Texas.
Following these events, Congress was able to pass the first significant legislation in decades to try to tackle the gun problem.
President Joe Biden signed the law into law in late June, saying that while it was not enough to tackle the gun problem, it would still save lives.
A day earlier, advocates of tougher gun control laws suffered a setback with a Supreme Court ruling that upheld the right to bear arms in public.
