‘Never again!’ Students demand action against gun violence in nation’s capital
Jaclyn Corin of Parkland, Fla., and Naomi Walder of Alexandria, Va., told The Post's Nicole Ellis why they attended the March for Our Lives in D.C. on March 24.
Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators gathered in the nation’s capital and cities across the United States on Saturday to demand action against gun violence, the latest and most visible show of force by a student-led political movement born in the wake of a deadly school shooting in Parkland, Fla.Led by students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where a shooter’s rampage last month left 17 dead, the teens who took the stage at the March for Our Lives in downtown Washington called for Congress to enact stricter gun-control laws in response to the nation’s relentless two-decade stretch of campus shootings. Hundreds of “sibling protests” were taking place in cities across the United States, including Philadelphia, New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.
Although the D.C. march was bankrolled by left-leaning celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey and George and Amal Clooney, students who survived the Parkland shooting have been its faces. Their unequivocal message on Saturday: The inaction that has repeatedly characterized federal lawmakers’ response to school massacres and everyday gun violence would no longer be tolerated.
“To the leaders, skeptics and cynics who told us to sit down, stay silent and wait your turn: Welcome to the revolution,” Cameron Kasky, a Stoneman Douglas student, said to a standing-room-only crowd that packed at least 10 blocks of Pennsylvania Avenue. “Either represent the people or get out. Stand for us or beware. The voters are coming.”
About 20 speakers — all of them children or teenagers — spoke to a strikingly diverse crowd that included students from every background: black and white, rich and poor, suburban and inner-city.
Together, they sang along to Miley Cyrus and Ariana Grande, shed tears during a chorus of “Happy Birthday” to a Parkland victim, and chanted “Never again!” as one of the movement’s leaders, Emma González, stood silently on the stage.
One of the rally’s most emotional speeches was delivered by Zion Kelly, a senior at Thurgood Marshall Academy in Washington, whose twin brother, Zaire, was shot and killed by a robber in September. Choking back tears before a rapt crowd, Kelly described the close bond he had with his brother.
“From the time we were born, we shared everything. I spent time with him every day because we went to the same schools, shared the same friends, and we even shared the same room,” he said. “I’m here to represent the hundreds of thousands of students who live every day in constant paranoia and fear on their way to and from school.”
Because many of the demonstrators were children, authorities in the nation’s capital said they were taking extra security precautions.
Callie Stone, 18, was walking down Pennsylvania Avenue before the march wearing a denim jacket emblazoned with “Nasty Woman,” a term President Trump used to insult Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election and that progressive women adopted as a moniker.
With Stone was her mother, whom Stone had told the previous day that she wasn’t sure she wanted to raise children in a world where students fear going to school. “But I said, ‘Look at you, at your generation — you all are bringing us hope,’” said Kelly Stone, 54.
Kelly Stone was a middle school student in Canada in 1975 when a gunman killed two people and himself at Brampton Centennial Secondary School, which she went on to attend. She said that incident has cast a long shadow over her life and that of her daughter.
Nearly 200 people have died in school shootings since the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado, which left 13 dead and inaugurated a relentless two-decade stretch of campus gun violence. During that period, more than 187,000 students attending at least 193 primary or secondary schools have experienced a shooting on campus during school hours, according to a Washington Post analysis.
“We’ve grown up knowing this could happen to us,” Stone said.
Great Mills students, wearing their green-and-gold school colors, were among those thronging the main stage Saturday afternoon.
Carmen Hill, 17, a Great Mills senior, said Willey had been in her fifth-period American Sign Language class. She said it was time for elected officials in Washington to take heed of the anger and activism that has seized the country in recent weeks.
“If they weren’t listening,” Hill said, “they are now.”
Organizers had hoped for a crowd of half a million in Washington. Police did not provide crowd estimates, though by 1 p.m. about 207,000 people had ridden the Metro, officials said. That was more than three times the average Saturday ridership, although it did not approach the 470,000 people who used the system by 1 p.m. for the Women’s March last year.
The White House issued a statement Saturday praising the marchers, despite their calls for tougher gun-control measures than President Trump supports.
“We applaud the many courageous young Americans exercising their First Amendment rights today,” White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said in the statement, in which she added that “keeping our children safe is a stop priority of the President’s.”
The president himself was in Florida at Trump International Golf Club, located about 35 miles from Parkland.
Williams’s cousin was shot four years ago. A classmate, Zoruan Harris, the quarterback for the football team, was fatally shot in 2016.
“As soon as stuff happened in Florida, everyone wanted to do something,” Williams said. “But every week someone gets shot in D.C.”
Survivors or relatives of those killed in other mass shootings were also at the march in Washington, including some from Columbine, Sandy Hook and Marysville Pilchuck High School in Washington state, where four were fatally shot in 2014.
By midafternoon Saturday, the rallies had proceeded peacefully, with small and scattered counterprotests by opponents of stricter gun control.
In Washington, a group of several dozen protesters in tactical gear bearing a “Don’t Tread on Me” flag stood by FBI headquarters, conversing with march demonstrators and enduring the occasional yell or middle finger.
In Boston, a group of about 25 counterprotesters gathered in front of the gold-domed Massachusetts statehouse to decry calls for tougher gun laws.
“I think it’s a little ridiculous,” Benjamin Johnson, 21, from New York, said of the March for Our Lives event. “After a tragedy like this one,” he said of the Parkland shooting, “everyone looks past the motives of the shooter and immediately focuses on guns. If you run over someone with a car, they don’t blame the car. But if someone is shot, they immediately blame the guns.”
Lori Aratani, Moriah Balingit, Kayla Epstein, Mary Hadar, Joe Heim, Marissa J. Lang, Luz Lazo, Erin Logan, Justin Wm. Moyer, Antonio Olivo, Dana Priest, Katie Shaver, Rachel Siegel, Ellie Silverman, Kelyn Soong, Shira Stein, Patricia Sullivan and Julie Zauzmer contributed to this report.
“I think it’s a little ridiculous,” Benjamin Johnson, 21, from New York, said of the March for Our Lives event. “After a tragedy like this one,” he said of the Parkland shooting, “everyone looks past the motives of the shooter and immediately focuses on guns. If you run over someone with a car, they don’t blame the car. But if someone is shot, they immediately blame the guns.”
Lori Aratani, Moriah Balingit, Kayla Epstein, Mary Hadar, Joe Heim, Marissa J. Lang, Luz Lazo, Erin Logan, Justin Wm. Moyer, Antonio Olivo, Dana Priest, Katie Shaver, Rachel Siegel, Ellie Silverman, Kelyn Soong, Shira Stein, Patricia Sullivan and Julie Zauzmer contributed to this report.
