Students:
1
million
expected
at
anti-gun-violence
marches By
JENNIFER
PELTZ
APNews.com
NEW
YORK -
Students
from the
Florida
high
school
where 17
people
were
fatally
shot
last
month
expect
more
than 1
million
participants
in
upcoming
marches
in
Washington
and
elsewhere
calling
for gun
regulations,
students
said
Monday.
More
than 800
March
for Our
Lives
demonstrations
are
planned
around
the
world
Saturday,
sparked
by the
Feb. 14
shooting
in
Parkland,
Florida.
“It
just
shows
that the
youth
are
tired of
being
the
generation
where
we’re
locked
in
closets
and
waiting
for
police
to come
in case
of a
shooter,”
Alex
Wind, a
junior
at
Marjory
Stoneman
Douglas
High
School,
told The
Associated
Press.
“We’re
sick and
tired of
having
to live
with
this
normalcy
of
turning
on the
news and
watching
a mass
shooting,”
he
added.
Since
the
massacre,
Stoneman
Douglas
students
have
been at
the
forefront
of a
push to
tighten
gun
restrictions
and
protect
schools.
They
have led
rallies
and
lobbied
lawmakers
in
Washington
and
Florida’s
capital,
Tallahassee.
Last
Wednesday,
tens of
thousands
of
students
around
the U.S.
walked
out of
their
classrooms
to
demand
action
on gun
violence
and
school
safety.
Stoneman
Douglas
students
fanned
out
Monday
to
discuss
the
marches
with
media
outlets
in New
York,
including
NBC’s
“Today”
show and
“CBS
This
Morning.”
Students
from the
Florida
high
school
where 17
people
were
fatally
shot
last
month
say they
expect
as many
as 1
million
participants
in
upcoming
marches
in
Washington
and
elsewhere
calling
for gun
regulations.
(Mar.
19)
The
National
Rifle
Association
didn’t
immediately
respond
to an
inquiry
Monday
about
the
upcoming
marches.
The
group
has said
any
effort
to
prevent
future
school
shootings
needs to
“keep
guns out
of the
hands of
those
who are
a danger
to
themselves
or
others,
while
protecting
the
rights
of
law-abiding
Americans.”
Amid
the wave
of
activism,
Florida
passed a
law
curbing
young
peoples’
access
to
rifles;
the NRA
has sued
to try
to block
it. Some
major
U.S.
retailers
decided
to curb
the sale
of
assault-style
rifles
or stop
selling
firearms
to
people
younger
than 21.
But
Congress
has
shown
little
appetite
for new
gun
regulations.
President
Donald
Trump at
one
point
proposed
raising
the
minimum
age for
buying
an
assault
rifle to
21 but
then
backed
off,
citing a
lack of
political
support.
The
Republican
president
has
since
released
a school
safety
plan
that
includes
strengthening
the
federal
background
check
system
and
helping
states
pay for
firearms
training
for
teachers,
while
assigning
the
buying-age
issue to
a
commission
to
study.
A
petition
associated
with
Saturday’s
march
calls
for
banning
sales of
assault
weapons
and
large-capacity
ammunition
magazines,
as well
as
tightening
background
checks.
The
suspect
in the
Parkland
shooting,
19-year-old
former
student
Nikolas
Cruz,
used an
AR-15
assault-style
rifle,
according
to
authorities.
His
lawyer
has said
Cruz
will
plead
guilty
in
return
for a
life
prison
sentence,
rather
than
possibly
facing
the
death
penalty.
The
Associated
Press
reported
Sunday
that
documents
show
some
officials
recommended
in
September
2016
that
Cruz be
involuntarily
committed
for a
mental
evaluation,
though
the
recommendation
was
never
acted
upon.
Such a
commitment
would
have
made it
more
difficult,
if not
impossible,
for Cruz
to get a
gun
legally.
Beyond
making a
statement,
Saturday’s
marches
aim to
make
political
change
by
registering
and
mobilizing
people
to vote.
But
the
students
insist
their
aim
isn’t
partisan:
“We’re
just
trying
to make
sure
that
morally
just
people
are
running
this
country,”
Stoneman
Douglas
senior
Ryan
Deitsch
told the
AP.
As
soon-to-be
voters,
the
students
say
they’re
here to
stay in
the
public
debate.
“We
are not
just a
presence
on
Twitter.
We are
not just
some
social
media
fad.
We’re
not like
Tide
Pods,”
Deitsch
said,
referring
to the
laundry
detergent
packets
that
recently
sparked
a
dangerous
social-media-fueled
trend of
teenagers
eating
them.
“We’re
trying
to push
this
idea
that we
have a
voice,
that
people
can
speak
out, and
that
that
voice
should
be
heard,”
Deitsch
said.