In the wake of the April 17 shootings at Florida State University, 28 students who previously attended Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and now study at FSU sent a letter to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis demanding he reject attempts to roll back bipartisan gun safety protections passed after the Parkland shooting.
The letter calls on DeSantis to change his position and publicly oppose legislation that would lower the minimum age to purchase firearms in Florida from 21 to 18. If passed, the legislation would reverse the heightened age limits former Governor Rick Scott signed into law. The students also called on the governor to reject campus-carry legislation and to strengthen Florida’s safe storage laws.
Jaclyn Corin, Executive Director and Co-Founder of March For Our Lives, said, “Despite everything we fought for in Florida in 2018, the same students who once hid from gunfire in Parkland are now sheltering in place at FSU. And yet, Governor DeSantis says nothing as lawmakers work to dismantle the very protections we helped put in place. These students lost friends, marched in the streets, and changed laws to save lives, only to be thrown back into the nightmare we swore would never happen again. How many more bodies will it take before DeSantis values student lives over gun lobby donations?”
Read the students’ letter in full here.
