David and Lauren Hogg visit ‘The ‘Tonight Show’
It was a reunion of sorts for Parkland siblings David and Lauren Hogg and NBC late night comedian Jimmy Fallon.
The Hoggs stopped by Fallon’s “The Tonight Show” Tuesday night where they promoted their new book, “#NeverAgain: A New Generation Draws the Line.”
Wearing an orange tag that with read “$1.05,” David Hogg began talking about how it “represents the amount of money that Marco Rubio, our senator in Florida, has taken from the NRA (National Rifle Association), divided by every student in the state which is $1.05.”
The siblings then recounted what they were doing on Feb. 14 when 17 classmates and faculty members were killed at Stoneman Douglas High School. Lauren Hogg, part of the Class of 2021, said how the beginning of that day was “one of the best days of high school” until the fire alarm rang when she was in her fourth period TV production class. She and her classmates thought “it was just like a Valentine’s Day prank” because they had a fire alarm drill earlier that day.
She described seeing kids “running and screaming” and seeing “the look in my friends’ eyes. I’ve never seen anything like it” and how she and her classmates ran and “hid in the corner of a closet in our classroom.”
David, who was a senior, said he was in his AP environmental science class, “our door was open and we heard the first gun shot. And I look over at my friend and I’m like, ‘That sounded kind of like a gun shot.’’’ He described having “a cold rush of fear race down my spine, thinking ‘Oh my God. This isn’t a drill.’”
The Hoggs also talked about why they wrote their new book, to create change to prevent future mass school shootings.
“We aren’t doing this for money,” said David Hogg, who added that the money from the book will go to taxes and charities including Change the Ref, a foundation started by the parents of Parkland student Joaquin Oliver who was killed in the shooting. Money will also go to Chicago Strong, which Hogg described as “a coalition of gun violence prevention groups in the city of Chicago that’s student-led and studentrun,’’ and the March for Our Lives movement.
The siblings also talked about the launch of the Road to Change bus tour which is taking Parkland students and supporters through the Midwest, and the importance of voting.
“Make sure you vote,” David Hogg said. “We have to get morally just leaders elected that aren’t Democrats or Republicans,’’ he said. “Don’t just vote for people because they have a D or an R next to their name. Make them have an A next to their name for American, for a human being...”
The Hoggs also invited people to join their bus tour by texting 97779.
Fallon said he was impressed by the students’ work and thanked them for coming on his show.
He has gotten to know the Hoggs and other Stoneman Douglas students this past year.
He took part in the students’ “March for Our Lives” rally March 24 in Washington D.C. And Fallon was a guest speaker at the school’s senior graduation ceremony June 3 at the BB&T Center in Sunrise. “change” to