‘Let’s put America first, NRA second’

Students plead for meaningful gun legislation

Two survivors of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting joined a panel of students making pleas for meaningful gun legislation in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday.

Juniors Charlie Mirsky and Alfonso Calderon had four minutes each to address the House Democratic Task Force on Gun Violence. They were among a panel of eight student leaders also coming from Hallandale Beach, Miami, Chicago and Rockville, Md., to bear witness to the firsthand effects of gun violence.

The reason for the assembly was a “despicable” one, Calderon said.

“There’s been a lot of talk, especially around here, about putting America first,” he said. “I agree, let’s put America first and put the gun lobbies and the NRA second. I don’t understand why this is such a difficult conversation to have.”

To kick off the session, U.S. Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Miami, urged her fellow task-force members to “listen to the children speak.”

“Gun violence is a plague that is affecting our nation,” Wilson said. “No one, nowhere, is

immune to it.”

Mirsky used his time to call for universal background checks and plead for lawmakers to resist letting “outside groups” affect their opinions and votes.

“For us, it touched home, we lost friends, we lost teachers and it changed our lives forever,” he said of the Feb. 14 shooting at his Parkland school that killed 17 and wounded 17 more. “And now, this is our mission.”

Also present was Malachi Dunn, a junior at Hallandale Magnet High School.

His school hadn’t experienced a mass shooting, he said, but gun violence was so prevalent in his community that he often finds himself feeling “paranoid” and “constantly looking around and making sure everything is safe and in check.”

Dunn’s closing remarks: “We have to be brave and face the fact that our nation has a problem with gun violence. We have to be bold and be the solution, and we have to act now because tomorrow isn’t promised.”