A somber President Barack Obama on Sunday expressed grief and outrage at the "horrific massacre" of 50 late-night revelers at an Orlando gay club, branding it an act of terror and hate, AFP reports.
"We know enough to say that this was an act of terror and an act of hate," Obama said.
It was the deadliest mass shooting in US history. In addition to the 50 killed, 53 people were wounded, some of them critically.
During his nearly eight years in office, Obama has been forced to issue heartfelt statements after more than a dozen previous mass shootings.
He frequently refers to a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, in which 20 young children and six adults were killed, as the worst day of his presidency.
But this attack has fanned the flames on several raging issues in US political and cultural life, in the midst of a bitter presidential election campaign from the fight against jihadists, to the battle over gay rights, to the seemingly never-ending debate over gun control.
