Hundreds of students gathered on Capitol Hill Friday to argue for gun control ahead of a Saturday march expected to bring hundreds of thousands to Washington, D.C.
Flanked by a handful of Democratic lawmakers, including former Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-Ariz.), the young advocates accused Congress of bowing to the wishes of the powerful National Rifle Association (NRA) at the expense of school safety.
“Students are stepping up to the NRA because our elected officials are afraid to,” Antiqua Flint, an 15-year-old high school student from North Minneapolis, Minn., said during a press briefing in front of the Capitol.
“The solution to violence is not more guns. We need to pass sensible laws to keep guns out of dangerous hands.”
The briefing marked an introduction of sorts to Saturday’s “March for Our Lives” demonstration. The student-driven event was sparked by last month’s shooting rampage at a high school in Parkland, Fla., where a lone gunman killed 17 people with a military-style rifle.
Rep. Ted Deutch
Theodore (Ted) Eliot DeutchJudiciary Dems warn Trump: Don't fire Mueller, Sessions during House recess Gun protests sweep nation as House passes school safety bill House passes school safety bill amid gun protests MORE[2][3][4][5][6][1], a Democrat who represents Parkland, said the student victims at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School “have energized the nation,” launching a new movement that could mark a “sea change” in the decades-old debate over gun reform.
“We knew that it would be different,” he said. ”Students decided that they weren’t going to simply allow this tragedy to become another statistic in a long line of horrific tragedies, or horrific acts of gun violence.”
Sen. Amy Klobuchar
Amy Jean KlobucharOvernight Cybersecurity: House Intel votes to release Russia report | House lawmakers demand Zuckerberg testify | Senators unveil updated election cyber bill Five takeaways from Mark Zuckerberg's media blitz Senators introduced revised version of election cyber bill MORE[8][9][10][11][12][7] (D-Minn.) offered another explanation for why the student protests could represent a tipping point in the debate.
“When kids ask,” she said, “it’s harder to say no.”
Congress this week passed a massive government spending bill that includes several provisions designed to tackle the nation’s gun-violence epidemic, particularly school shootings. One aims to strengthen — but not expand — the federal background check system before gun purchases. Another provides grants to school districts to help identify and counsel students with behavioral problems that might accelerate into violence. A third empowers federal researchers to study gun violence as a public health issue.
All told, the reforms mark the most drastic changes to the nation’s gun laws since 2007, when Congress stepped in to bolster background checks after the shooting massacre at Virginia Tech the same year.
The provisions do nothing, however, to restrict gun sales or ownership.
“There’s a long way to go,” said Sen. Bill Nelson
Clarence (Bill) William Nelson
