Sen. Mike Regan tweeted that school superintendents are 'clueless' about security - then changed his mind

State Sen. Mike Regan, R-Cumberland (PennLive file)

Like a lot of us, state Sen. Mike Regan, R-Cumberland, was outraged and saddened by Wednesday's school shooting at a South Florida high school that claimed the lives of 17 people.

And, like a lot of us, he hopped on Twitter to express his outrage and share his thoughts on the swiftly moving story.

And like a lot of us have after posting a hasty Tweet (the author included), he got called on it, and had to find a way to un-ring that bell.

Here's how Regan's page looked around 8:30 a.m. on Thursday:

And here's how it looked by mid-afternoon:

The earlier Tweet, you'll notice, is history.

So what gives?

Reached for comment on Thursday afternoon, Regan said he'd been contacted by a school superintendent in his district who'd taken exception to his language, and he decided to delete the offending tweet.

Regan declined to identify the school official who contacted him. The conversation, according to those familiar with it, was a productive one.

"I was a little bit hot on this," Regan, a former deputy U.S. Marshal, said of the school shooting. "I've seen changes at [schools] but not enough changes."

Local superintendents, Regan told PennLive, have enough on their plates trying to educate students. But now they've become "cops." And that's an "uneviable task, he said.

"We need experts in security to make recommendations," to school districts on how to best make schools safe and then secure them from there, and not leave such matters to local school boards, who might be well-intentioned, but just out of their depth on such issues.

"It's just not in their wheelhouse," he said.

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