Gun-control activists hold protest near Mar-a-Lago

PALM BEACH — Standing near Mar-a-Lago, Parkland student Caspen Becher wanted President Donald Trump to hear her message.

“I am sick and tired of you not doing anything,” said Becher, 15. “We are done dying. We don’t want to die anymore. I am done being shot at. I am done being victimized.”

Becher was one of about 50 students who participated in a die-in protest Tuesday across the Intracoastal Waterway from Trump’s Palm Beach estate. The event marked the two-year anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando that killed 49 people.

The rising sophomore at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School recalled running out of her school on Feb. 14 with her hands raised to show police she didn’t have a gun. Seventeen students and staff died in the shooting that day.

Demonstrators sprawled on the ground for 12 minutes as a symbol of the lives lost to gun violence and what they consider to be a failure to pass tighter restrictions on firearms. One of the protesters held a bullhorn and read the names of the 49 people who died at Pulse.

Every 12 minutes worldwide someone dies of gun violence, activists say. Late Monday, it was discovered four children had been shot and killed in Orlando.

The students held signs that read, “Orlando will never stop beating” and “Ban AR-15 #Enough.”

Demonstrators say they want universal background checks for gun sales, along with a ban on military-style weapons and