Transcripts For FOXNEWSW Your World With Neil Cavuto 20180221

But looks like there wont be there. There will be representatives from some d. C. Schools and from sandy hook, the founders of rachels challenge, which is an organization dedicated to lowering School Violence and the mayor of parkland will be in attendance as well. This will go out live and a tv event that you can watch as it unfolds. The president will be in listening mode this afternoon. Hes been kicking around some ideaing with his closest advisers and people on the outside as to what could be done to address this epidemic, not only of School Shootings but Mass Shootings as we saw october 1 in las vegas where all of those people were mercilously gunned down. T the rate of fire might be slower with bump stocks but doesnt count for much in terms of how much slower it is compared to fully automatic weapon. The president considering raising the minimum age for people to either possess or buy a gun. Currently its 21. To buy a handgun. To buy a long gun, its 18. But he may have to defer to states on that its a patch work across america. Some states like massachusetts, you can be as young as 15 and possess a long gun with the approval of your parents. The president looking at ways to tighten up background checks for people that are purchasing weapons as well. People that are mentally ill do not fall through the cracks and end in the possession of a firearm as happened last week in parkland. Neil looking at the list of attendees and students and teachers, do we know how they were chosen . Critics of the president tweeting back and forth. Im wondering how this collection came about. Im told that these were people that expected interest in being part of the discussion this afternoon. One name that is not on the list, the person invited, is david hogg. Youve seen him on television a lot since wednesday. Hes the son of the fbi agent who has done a lot of television interviews. He was also at the rally in tallahassee today. He was invited but he said he wanted to go to the tallahassee rally and couldnt atenned here at the white house. These are people that expressed an interest in being part of the discussion. As to how people from local schools were chosen, the white house has not detailed from that. They looked to have representatives from columbine but they wont be here. Neil all of this on a day, protests that were originally started in tallahassee, florida and has extended nationwide and going to go more nationwide as better than a dozens of schools in florida started and now spread beyond that. Most of them demanding action on the part of state legislators and others to not just give lip service to gun reform but to do something about it. The read from ari fleischer, the press secretary for george w. Bush. So youre seeing this and how this went down. How it continues to be a big National Issue now with some of these same protesters planning to do the same in washington next month. Others promising follow up rallies ahead of that. How should the president handle this pentup different kind of rage . A lot of it is from kids. He needs to do two things. He needs to listen today, act tomorrow. This is an issue, neil, where our country finally has to get serious about this violence in the schools. We cannot be this type of country. We cannot be. Children should not have to go through this. Parents shouldnt have to go through this. The solution is in the hands of adults. Doesnt have to involve gun control. A series of things that can and should be done to prevent guns from falling into the hands of people that should never have guns in the first place. And that could include raising the age to 21 for all long arms and firearms, hand held guns, which is already the law of the land for firearms is 21. I think the issue that is really going to test us is going to be how far so we violate peoples Civil Liberties if theres any involvement in Mental Illness issues. At what point you say you cannot have a weapon. We have to push in that direction. Thats where the fault line is. Neil you talk about the alternatives to outright gun reform and that sort of thing outside of raising the age for certain weapons that sort of thing. For a lot of those kids in particular and their parents, anything short of a dramatic revamp of our gun laws isnt going to cut. Isnt the debate here, for the moment, if people are expecting if the kids are expecting or their parents are expecting that the gun laws wont be as much a part of this, then how does it how do the politicians handsel the inevitable rap that will come their way . The gun laws will be affected. What i talking about will change your ability to get a gun. And the background checks, too. Those are the types of things we need to be doing. The issue is do you ban certain categories of guns. I expect thats where a dividing line will be. Neil thats what the kids want. A lot of them want to see fewer of these guns, fewer of these types of weapons on the streets. Then what . Some of them articulately and emotionally made the case to repeal the Second Amendment. Some said it was written 240 years ago and we dont need it today. A lot of different points of view there. I suspect its not going to get passed to law. The reason for that is because theres an entire broader category of people that are legal possessors of weapons and their rights shouldnt be infringed. If you own a weapon and have never don anything wrong, why should the state take that away from you . If i thought that taking ar15s away would fix this issue, id be for it. I dont think it will work. Neil not even in combination with some of the other stuff you alluded to . Well, the other stuff can and should pass and will have an impact. Thats what i want to see. If you start going down the line of we have to outlaw categories of guns first of all, the democrats arent going to vote for it. They didnt after new town. When emotions were terribly raw, the democrats had 55 seats. 16 voted against it. That was a revision of the assault weapon ban. So i dont even know if the votes are there to do that. The point is, is that the effective action to take . I welcome the voice of these students. Its the right thing to go to tallahassee, let their voices be heard. But ultimately the decision has to be made by legislators, state and federal, who take all the different points of view into accounts. Now the time has come to act. If im the president , neil, id lead this train. I come up with a package of what the four or five changes are. I demand that Congress Pass them. Donald trump was elected to get things done in washington, this is the ultimate time to get things done. Neil wellput. Thanks, ari. Were about seven minutes away from this listening session at the white house. The president meeting with various groups including those affected in florida. Students, parents, those that survived other shootings and their parents and what to make of where we go now. Florida republican state representative, House Majority whip, representative eagle. Thanks for taking your time. Did you get a chance to meet any of these kids today, any of their chaperones, teachers, parents . Thanks for having me on, neil. I had a great robust discussion with them in my office. Its great to see them after having gone what they did, making a trip up here to speak with legislators. Its remarkable. I had one of the best discussions with these kids. Neil what did they want from you and what did you tell them . They want to make sure this never happens again. Theyre open to discussion. What can we do to do that . Its about building that puzzle Work Together, make sure that our schools are safe, that Mental Health issues are in place. Someone like this, this monitor, nikolas cruz can never get his hands on a weapon ever again. If someone like this does want to cause harm, theyre not able to get into a cause and cause this kind of mass tragedy on our children. Neil i was here for a good chunk of it earlier today. Some of them were demanding getting some of these weapons themselves off of the street what do you think of that . How did you address that . They talk about outright bans and what can we do. We had a healthy discussion about that we talked about if we ban it, does this solve the problem. If we ban Assault Rifles, what is the definition of Assault Rifle . Its Something Different to you and me. We have a Second Amendment in this country. We have a constitutional right to protect ourselves. We can look at that and have discussions to make sure that people that are mentally ill are not getting their hands on weapons. We cannot strip guns altogether. We will have that discussion, but if we were to ever discuss and outright ban, we will still have mass killings in the country. With have to make sure that people like this are not getting their hands on weapons and beyond that, make sure our schools are safe. If people can get their hands on a knife, gun, vehicle, whoever they want to do to inflict the most harm possible. Neil a lot of them are demanding to know where governor rick scott was and wanted to talk to him. Do you know if that happened . Im not sure if Governor Scott was even in the building today. Hes been having discussions with everybody. Ill tell you since this happened this happened while we were on the floor last week. Democrats and republicans came together and the speaker of the house and weve been working on robust plan that we hope to introduce shortly. The discussions neil what will that robust plan be . I look forward to releasing the details as they come out. It will look at certain weapons and whether whose hands are getting into it and looking to make sure that our schools are secure. Theres a lot of details that go into that. Those discussions are ongoing and happening in a bipartisan matter, happening with the senate and the governor. As soon as theyre released, which is soon, the whole world will know about it and im pleased that we can get something done. Neil thanks, representative. I want to bring ben stein in this. Hes a former speechwriter for president nixon, author among other things. What is happening now, ben, theres a move afoot here not to just let another School Shooting go by unadressed. This time might be different is that its kids getting involved. First, what do you think of that . What do you think of their message . Most of the kids at least want to do something about banning lets say guns like the ar15. I think its a damn good idea to ban the ar15. The ar15 is a weapon that is extremely seductive. Looks like a weapon of war. Make a person that is a nerd, go into a gun shots and making him feel like rambo. Theres no reason to have it. Its not an ideal target shooting weapon, a home defense weapon. Its a weapon for to take people into the realm of fantasy and some of those people are diluted and take it into the whelm of reality. Take the ar15 and its many, many cousins and mix them up with violent video games and you have a recipe for disaster. The disaster has happened too many times now. It doesnt work. Im a big Second Amendment guy. I probably have as many guns as all of your other economists put together. But the the Second Amendment is not to have militarystyle weapons in the hands of civilians. Neil theres many advocates of the Second Amendment and concerned that as soon as you take one gun away, its a matter of time before you take others away and its a slippery slope. You say . Its a camels nose going under the tent. But look, we banned machine guns from 1934 to 1936. There is some reasonableness on the part of representatives and members of the government. Some. Not a lot. Theyre not going to take away all weapons. People want weapons, people need weapons. Its important that a big fat nerdy guy like me can have a weapon in his night stand in case some strong young guy comes in and wants to take my box about economics. Its very, very importants that people have home defense weapon. Its important for target shooters, hunters have access to weapons. Nobody needs a gun out of a war movie in america. Neil by the way, youre not big and fat. I did want to get on how the president handles this. Hes going to have some people whose nerves are pretty raw in that room. I dont know how these individuals are selected. You know, theyre upset. Theyre very, very upset. Very upset. Neil some might get in his face. We dont know that. But its possible. When people are upset, they say things. How do you im not worried about him. He can handle himself. He is the one guy only nixon could go to china. Only trump can ban the ar15 because Everybody Knows hes pro Second Amendment, hes not going to be pushed around by the wimpy guys and think tank offices in washington d. C. Hes the one guy that can take away the ar15 and its cousins. Believe me, theres still plenty of great weapons out there, plenty of great gun stores out there. Im a huge fan of gun stores. I love being in gun stores. I have a lot of guns. I just dont think we need a weapon that says to the person buying it, please use me to kill people. Neil much have been made from privacy advocates, be careful what you wish for when you want to better screen those that might have access to guns or put out there for all to know what medications theyre taking either activity disorders or a lot of other ailments because they have a Scarlet Letter on them. And then theyre ostracized even more. What do you think of that . I think theres an enormous infringement on privacy in so many ways that this is just another pin prick. Its not very important. Look, were seeing something really stunning happen. Our schools are becoming slaughter houses. That is an outrage in a society. As wonderful as the United States of america is, this is the best country in the entire world by a million miles, the best thing god ever made among human societies. We can accepted a little tiny bit of infringement of privacy in order to keep these massacres from happening again. By the way, i would not only stop manufacturing the ar15s, stop selling them. People have them, you can keep them, keep them in your closet as a souvenir, but lets not have anymore more sales of them. Lets just call it quits on the Assault Rifles. Youve had your fun. Now lets call it quits. Neil i cant repeat some of the emails im getting about you right now. It aint fun to kill people. It aint fun to kill people. Neil you raise a good point. These are heated times. Ben stein, thanks very much. God bless you, neil. Neil were still waiting to hear from the president and this listening session. Lets go to rich edson, tallahassee, florida with the latest only some very angry young people who are not satisfied right now. Sir . Good afternoon, neil. This were several events that converged on florida capitol complex behind me. A rally that just let out a couple hours ago. And then ended up filtering back in to the florida capitol complex where a number of the students here protesting were chanting you work for us, vote them out, where is rick scott the governor of florida and hear us now. The rally was attended by a number of students, even students from parkland where the shootings took place. It was a largertype rally. In the building behind that, thats where the legislating happens. Thats where the students from the high school in parkland went today to lobby their legislators and they speak afterwards about the terrible experience, lifechanging experience that they had last week and what theyre expecting from their lawmakers. Neil rich, was there concern that the legislators were not hearing them . Absolutely. They said so. They said that they were worried that some of the legislators were interested in basically placating them, but not moving on legislation in which they only have a couple weeks to do so before the term ends in florida. Neil theyre going to take it national. They promised to do that. To what end . They are. Theres other students that are lobbying neil all right, my friend. But its a matter of keeping it up. Neil all right. Thanks very much. Were going to pause for a moment to let our fox stations join us right now. Neil this is fox news coverage. The president is about to hold a listening session. Im neil cavuto in new york. The president wanted this moment to get an idea from those that directly had to deal with this. The president is using this opportunity now to speak to those that were direct victims of this or knew those that were and a chance to address gun violence and provide solutions for it, this listening event planned after last weeks tragic shooting. The president is going to find a way or find out how to move forward. Again, this Group Includes those not only who were in florida last week at the time of the shooting including some students, their parents, teachers, but those from other prior events that the president said it has to stop, this is routine. This has happened too often and the president has made it clear he hopes to put an end to it and this could be the beginning. Great to have you here. Im going to be listening to some of your suggestions. Ive heard some of them. Were going to do something about this horrible situation going on. I want to listen and then after i listen, were going to get things done. Pastor, if you could possibly say the prayer, we could appreciate it. Thank you. Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be your name. We thank you for this day that you have given us. We just know the things that have happened here in america, that theres something that you have a plan and it will be a great one. Were going to get our country back on track. I ask that you extend your holy spirit to comfort us through this time. Right now we embrace your words. So holy spirit, we ask you to comfort the families and even the families that didnt lose a loved one but know that they were there at that time. Comfort them also. Father, i ask in the name of jesus christ, that we just welcome you here in this room. In jesus name we play, amen. Amen. Thank you very much, pastor. I appreciate it. Vice president , you wanted to say id like you to say a few words and then introduce you you to betsy devos that most of you know and some of you have met a little while ago. Mike, what do you have to say . First off, thank you, mr. President. I want to thank the families from parkland for being here. Assure you of the deepest condolences and specifically from the first family and our family and of the American People. As the president said last week, the American People are united with one heart, broken, for what took place. But the president called this meeting for us as much to talk about what has happened in our country the last 20 years and to find out from all of you gathered here by listening, by learning and to ensure that this is the last time this ever happens. I, along with the president , are deeply moved by the stories of heroism and courage. Im candidately moved by the courage that it takes for many of you to be here today. What i just want to encourage you to do, tell us your stories. America is looking on. Your president , our entire administration, leaders around the country at every level are looking on. We want to hear your hearts today. I encourage you to be candid and vulnerable. Share with us not only your personal experience but what it is that you would have us to do. Just know that as the president has already taken action, he will be meeting in this very room in the coming days with governors from all 50 states to make School Safety the top priority of this administration across this country. The president and i want to hear from you first. I want to say thank you for coming, thank you for the courage and willing to be here and share your hearts. From our families to your families, god bless you. Thank you, mike, very much. Betsy . Thank you, mr. President. Students, teachers, parents, thanks for being here. For many of you, you lived through something unthinkable. Many of you, its raw and fresh. I admire your strength and bravery to come here, share your experiences to the president , the Vice President and the world. No student, no parent, no teacher should ever have to endure what you all have. My heart is broken. What happens last week shocked us. It angers us and pains us. Were here to have an earnest conversation about why this tragedy an too many others before it happened and how we can work to find solutions. Were here to listen, to gain your important perspective on ways to reduce violence and protect students. Our hope is that by talking and by listening we can make something that was unthinkably bad something good. And your loss and your trauma must never be in vain. So thank you again for being here. Lets get started. Thank you very much, betsy. I just want to say before we begin because i want to hear you, but were going to be very strong on background checks. Were going to be doing very strong background checks, a strong emphasis on the Mental Health of somebody and were going to do plenty of other things. Again, next week the governors are coming in from most of the states and were going to have a very serious talk about what is going on with School Safety. Very important. Were going to cover every aspect of it. Many ideas that i have, many ideas that other people have. Were going to pick out the strongest ideas, the most important ideas, the ideas that will work and were going to get them done. Its not like its going to be talk. Too many instances. Were going to get it done. So again, i want to thank you all for being here. Id like to hear your story. Id also like to, if you have any suggestions for the future based on this horrible experience that youve gone through, id love to have that as well. All right. Thank you, mr. President , for inviting me here. My name is julie. Im from Stoneman Douglas high school. I was there during the shooting. Im a survivor. I want you guys all to emphasize the point that i survived. I was lucky enough to come home from school. Unlike some of my other classmates and teachers. And its very scary. And knowing that a lot of people did not have this opportunity to be here still, its mindblowing. Im just i feel like there is a lot to do. I really appreciate you like hosting me and what youre saying. Im confident that youll do the right thing and i appreciate you looking at the bump stocks yesterday. That means its a step in the right direction. We can all agree on that. Theres a lot more to go. But im just grateful that im here and we can work out something. Maybe compromise on some solutions so this never no child, no person in this world will ever have to go through something so horrific and tragic. My thoughts and prayers are out to everybody. Hello. Im jonathan. I go to Stoneman Douglas. I was actually in the second classroom that was shot at. In my mind, as a kid nothing that horrible should ever have to happen to you. You cant even think about it. It doesnt even seem real still. Everything seems fake. I cant even i dont know what is going on. Its just crazy. Everything happening. Its just so tragic. Thank you for everything. Youve done a great job. I like the direction youre going in. Thank you. My name is melissa blank. Jonathan is my son. I have student in middle school. I had to find out if my son was alive. I feel for all of these families, my heart is just broken, for my whole community. We are coming together. I feel for all the families that have lost, and i feel for the ones that are here because we now have almost a guilt like i have. Why not my child . Which i feel bad saying, that im happy hes here with me. I feel so bad for all of you who have lost so many. And im just begging for a change. We need a change. Do you mind if i pass the microphone back to my daughter . I think she has some nice solutions. Is that okay with sure. Hi. My name is carson. Im a junior. I was at marjory Stoneman Douglas at the time of the shooting. I know theres a lot of solutions to go through to help eradicate this issue. One that stuck out to me was about all of the drills and protocols that my teachers had to go through. They knew what to do once the code red for an active shooter is announced. Through research i found that 32 states require drills. Of those 32 states, more than half of the counties do not go through the drills because they want to spend their resources towards something else. And i know that a bill was also passed that declared that each school has to go through one drill each month. But i know that my school, we go through fire drills every month. We have not had our lockdown drill yet this year. I think a change that will increase all of the trainings and protocols so if god forbid another shooting does happen, all least all the teachers will be prepared and keep their students calm. Thats good. Thank you. My name is ariana. I would like to say thank you for leading this country. Youre a great leader. I appreciate your direction that the country is going in. Im a junior. I attended Stoneman Douglas. I want to say that everybody right now is so stuck on what they believe, that theyre not listening to what other people believe. We need to listen to the other points of views. We all need to realize that we all have different points of views and that we need this solution is not a singular thing. Its going to be multifaceted and created by a collection of different people working together. We all have to realize that we all have our opinions and together were going to be able to work to a solution. This is not just parklands anymore. This is america. This is every student and every city and everywhere. Its everybody. Its not small. Its everything. Thank you for having us. Thank you for being here. We appreciate it. My name is fred. Im carsons dad. Im going to pass the microphone along to some of the other students. If we have a chance later on, perhaps ill speak. Id like to students to get their chance. Very nice. Im justin. I was at the school at the time of the massacre. Im only 15 years old. Im a sophomore. 19 years ago the first School Shooting Columbine High School happened. I was born into a world where i never got to experience safety and peace. There needs to be a significant change in this country. This has to never happened again. People should be able to feel that when they go to school, they can be safe. Because there needs to be a change. Im sorry. People need to feel safe. Parents shouldnt have to go through the idea of losing their child. As i know from my dad, he was panicking. He couldnt imagine it. So that shouldnt even be a possibility that should go through a parents mind. There needs to be some change. Thank you. Thank you. Im carey. Ill be brief. Justin was texting me, hiding in a closet saying that if somebody happens, i love you. You cant imagine what that is like as a parent. An then his phone died. I didnt know what happened for another hour. So 17 lives are gone. I was lucky enough to get my son home. 17 families. This is its not left and right, its not political. Its a human issue. People are dying. We have to stop this. We have to if youre not old enough to buy a drink, to buy a beer, you should not be able to buy a gun at 18 years old. Thats just common sense. We have to do common sense. Please, mr. Trump, these are things we have to do. In israel, you have to be 27 years old to have a gun. Only allowed one. They tax the guns. You have to go through significant training. We got to do something about this. We cannot have our children die. This is just heart breaking. Please. Thank you. Thank you. Hi. Im shannon morris. Im a local administrator in d. C. I want to continue the conversation for our students. Hi. Im also a local educator here in washington d. C. I will allow our students that are here to voice their opinions as well as give some of their ideas to do that at this time. And my condolences and my heart truly go out to not just the families that have lost children in this horrific incident that has occurred, but also to our families here in the District Of Columbia that experience gun violence outside of our schools, that directly impact our schools. Because they are our students. Thank you. Hello. Im olia barnett. And i go to school in d. C. My condolences to every family here that experienced the shooting and all the students that experienced that. Im here on behalf of my school and all of the friendship schools in d. C. To be able to prevent those kind of things happening in our school because in southeast d. C. , we do encounter a lot of violence and things. Most of the time at night, but a lot of the times its like the daytime, too. So our schools, we do take preventative measures and everything to stop that. Like we check bags at the door and everything. It does make us at first were like no, we dont want to do this. But then we realize its for our safety. But we want to make sure that it continues and that nothing can ever slip up to for these things to happen. Like in school, counselling for our students that are struggling with fear and bullying. Bullying triggers emotions that will make a student want to bring a weapon to school to protect themselves or to get revenge for a person that did something to them. So we just want to have a lot of preventative measures to be in the schools and also outside of school to make sure that nothing can happen to us while were in school. Thank you. Thank you very much. Hello, mr. President. Thank you for having us. Im christine. Im the mayor of parkland. We have a great city. Its one of the safest cities in america. The fact that this happened in our city means it can happen anywhere. We are blessed that where very close knit, oriented city. Our community is coming together. We lost 17 lives, but the ripple effects throughout the community are devastating. I spent the last week going to funerals. Friends of mine lost their children. We have to at some point care enough and be Strong Enough to come up with solutions. I hope we will. If i might, i had two parents that lost children this past week text me some of their thoughts, if i might share them with you. Thank you. I spoke to jennifer and tony montalto. They buried their daughter, gina, yesterday. And their comments were tony is an airline pilot. He said he supports the Second Amendment but he does not believe theres a need for Assault Rifles. He said that the fbi, there were signs missed and reminded him of 911. So we have to work on making sure that our protocols are in place so that people dont slip through the cracks literally in this case. We talked about the red flag laws. Theres a little progress being made in florida now on the red flag laws, which is when somebody shows signs of hurting themselves or someone else, you can take their gun away from them. Fred guttenberg, the service for his daughter, jamie, was last week on friday. He would like the administration to publicly acknowledge the role of guns. These two parents talked about guns and theyre absolutely lots of areas that where theres room for improvement. Lots of areas from Mental Health, from teacher training, but also part of that is also the gun issue. So its not that its just those and not the gun. Its all of them. In the debate world, the High School Debate world, the kids talk about when they bring up legislation, you want to have impacts. Youre not bringing up legislation that does havent a positive impact. What is the positive impact of having legislation that stops Assault Rifles . Bans Assault Rifles . It could save a life. That needs to be a priority in any case. When we talk about rights, so we have the right for free speech. Free speech in any way endangers someone, it gets restricted. I think i appreciate were coming here to listen and i appreciate that were coming here to look at all different perspectives because we need to be action and solution oriented. Thank you. Neil youve been watching a riveting exchange here between parents, administrators, students themselves who were at marjory Stoneman Douglas high school. The most moving moment a father of a 15yearold that is lucky to have his son with him. Maybe this is a matter of the gun laws themselves and who gets access to guns and when and what kind of background checks are required and what agencies can be on the same page and how quickly it can be addressed. Stay tuned to Fox News Channel and this fox station for continuing coverage of this story, this is a fox news special report. Im neil cavuto in new york. Neil now were going back to this session, the president trying to get a handle of those and everyone that suffered this event, those affected directly and indirectly affected and how to move on. Its simply. Its not difficult. We protect sports, we protect concerts, stadiums, embassies, the department of education that i walked in today that had the Security Guard in the elevator. How does that make me feel . In the elevator they have a Security Guard. Im angry this happening. 9 11 happened once and they fixed everything. How many schools, how many children have to get shot . It stops here with this administration and me. Im not going to sleep until its fixed. Mr. President , were going to fix it. Im going to fix it. Im not going to rest. Look, my boys need to live with this. I want to see everyone. Look at this. Me, im im a man. But to see your children go through this, bury their sister. So thats what i keep saying. I want it to sink in. Not forget about this. We cant forget about it. All the School Shootings. Doesnt make sense. Fix it. Should have been one School Shooting and we should have fixed it. Im pissed. Because my daughter im not going to see again. Shes not here. Shes not here. Shes in king david cemetery. Thats where i go to see my kid now. It stops. If we all Work Together and come up with the right idea that School Safety. Its not about gun laws. Thats another fight, another battle. Lets fix the schools and then you guys can battle it out, whatever you want. We need our children safe. Monday, tomorrow, whatever day it is. The kids go to school. You think everyones kids are safe . I didnt think it was going to happen to me . If i knew that, i would have been at the School Every Day if i knew it was that dangerous. Its enough. Get together, work with the president and fix the schools. Thats it. No other discussions. Security, whatever we have to do. Get the right people. The consultants. These are our commodities. Im never going to see my kid again. Know that. Never ever will i see my kid. I want that to sink in. My beautiful daughter, im never going to see again. Its simple. Its not we can fix it. This is my son who has to deal with this, too. You have something to say, son . I just want to add, its imperative to the safety of everyone to support free market and free flow of ideas. Listen to people on listen to radical opinions on both sides. And thats how well find solutions. You let people battle it out in a free flow of ideas. Censorship has to stop. Thats how we find the solutions, by listening to everyone. Having an open mind. This is my son hunter. Class of 15, marjory stone man douglas. I walked the same hallways where all died. I want to thank the president for having us. We had a very effective meeting before we walked in this room. Mr. Vice president as well and madam secretary, i put all of my trust in them and my father together that well be able to find the solution. Thats all i have to say. Thank you for having us. My name is sam. Im a student from marjory Stoneman Douglas in parkland. I just want to take a second to thank you for having me, mr. President , mr. Vice president , madam secretary. I was on the second floor in that building. Texting my mom. Texting my dad. Texting three of my brothers that i was never going to see them again. And then it occurred to me and my 14yearold brother was directly above me in that classroom where scott was murdered. Scott got my brother in the class. He was the last kid to get back in that class. Im sure a lot of you have read my texts on the internet to my brother. I didnt plan for them to go viral. I just wanted to share with the world because no brothers or sisters or family members or anyone should ever have to share those texts with anyone. Thats why im here. I lost a best friend. Practically a brother. Im here to use my voice because i know he cant. I know hes with me. Cheering me on to be strong, but its hard. To feel like this, it doesnt feel like a week. Time has stood still. To feel like this ever, i cant feel comfortable and my country knowing that people have, will have or ever going to feel like this. I want to feel safe at school. Senior year, junior year, big years for me when i turned my academics around, started connecting with teachers and starting enjoying school. And now i dont know how im ever going to step foot in that place again. Or go to a public park after school. Or walk anyway. Me and my friends, we get scared when a car drives by. Anywhere. I agree with hunter and huck and how we need to let ideas flow and get the problem solved. I dont understand. I turned 18 the day after. Woke up to the news that my best friend was gone. I dont understand why i can still go in a score and buy a weapon of war, an ar. I was reading today that a person 20 years old walked into a store and bought an ar15 and five minutes with an expired i. D. How is it that easy to buy this type of weapon . How are we not stopping this after columbine, after sandy hook, sitting with a mother that lost her son . Its still happening. In australia, there was a shooting at a school in 1999. You know, after that they took a lot of ideas, put legislation together. They stopped it. Can any one here guess how many shootings theres been since then in the schools in australia . Zero. We need to do something. Thats why were here. So lets be strong for the fallen that dont have a voice to speak anymore and lets never let this happen again. Please. Please. Mr. President , Vice President , madam secretary, my story is far too wellknown. I had two sons that were at sandy hook school. My eldest who was 8 at the time survived and my 6yearold son dillon did not. And i have been working tirelessly on this issue for over five years now. The organization that i helped lead Sandy Hook Promise is focused on keeping kids safe at school because no parent should go through this. Every parent that sends their kid to school should know without any question in their mind that theyre going to be coming home that day. This is not a difficult issue. Youre absolutely right. This are solutions. And this administration has the ability to put them in place. After sandy hook, they said we wouldnt let this happen again. Yet it is continuing to happen for five years. How many more deaths can we take as a country . How many more teenagers and 6 and 7yearolds can we allow to die . Dont let that happen on your watch. Theres things that you can do right now. Mental health, you mentioned earlier. Funding for that would be very much appreciated. Stop School Violence act. Enabling prevention programs and reporting systems across america passed through the house, in the senate right now. Urge swift passage of that. That can get a lot of help to schools. I agree since sandy hook theres been an increase in School Safety and security. Weve invested a lot in the bricks and mortar of our schools and the security of our schools. I think we also need to focus on prevention. How do we prevent these acts from happening. How can we help identify and get help for people who are at risk of hurting others. Thats what we need to focus on. Preventing the acts. You have the ability to do that. Theres legislation available right now. Theres free Training Programs available across the state right now. You can mandate these sorts of programs. You can ensure that schools, students and educators are trained how to recognize these signs and to know what they do when they see them and ensure the tips are followed through. This is not difficult. These deaths are preventible. I implore you, consider your own children. You dont want to be me. No parent does. You have the ability to make a difference and save lives today. Please dont waste this. Thank you. Mr. President , Vice President , mrs. Devos, thank you for inviting us to be here today. Im weak today. I had surgery last week. Im weak in the voice and body. But 19 years ago, i went through some of what the folks went through now because my beautiful daughter, rachel, was killed. My son, craig, was in the library that day. Two of his friends were murdered beside him. He laid there covered in their blood looking down the barrel of two guns aimed at him and he knew he was going to do. A split second before, the alarm system went off and they never came back to the table where craig was at or i would have lost two children that day at columbine. My heart goes out to you, sir and to everyone in this room that experienced the trauma that youre going through at parkland. Our focus has been my beautiful wife is right there, the blue and white blouse. Sandy. We started a program called rachels challenge. It was started a year after rachel died. And we have worked with some wonderful partners over the last few years. We worked closely with chuck norris and his wife, gina, and a program they call kick start for kids. We work with cal ripken jr. And his brother, bill and a program called the uncommon athlete. Its based on something that my daughter wrote in one of her diaries. We have a program called why try and another program called love and logic, dr. Jim faye, one of the largest parenting programs. All of us combine our efforts together. Our organization has reached over 28 Million Students in the last 19 years. We have seen seven School Shootings prevented. We see an average of three suicides prevented every week of the year, over 150 a year. I have a little book with me that id like to leave with you. Its got letters from students. We dont edit them. These are emails from students who are planning to commit suicide. We see three of those every single week. Students that have changed their mind. And if you dont mind, i just want to share one simple principle with you that we learned over the years as we worked with millions and millions of young people. It comes from something that you said last week in your speech. It was that we must create a culture of connectedness. We must create a culture in which our classmates become our friends. Thats something that we learned how to do over the years. We have over 28 different programs. We see children connect with one another. Every single one of these School Shootings have been from young men who are disconnected, and we talk a lot about the Mental Health issues. It actually goes deeper than that. Theres a lot of mentally ill children that are kind and compassionate. So we work with those children every single day of the year, of the school year. But theres always one with the propensity to violence. One of the things weve learned and we training young people and train teachers, the focus must not be just on unity or diversity. Because if you focus too much on diversity, you create division. If you focus too much on unity, youll create compromise. If you focus on relatedness and how we can relate, you celebrate the diversity and see the unity take place. Im all for diversity and for unity. The focus needs to be on how can we connect. Thats something that we in our organizations have learned. One thing we have learned is how to connect students with each other, with themselves and teachers and parents. And i would love to share more as we have a chance to do so. Thank you you again for having us today. President trump this is an Incredible Group of people. We really do appreciate it. Some of the folks in the back of my friends sitting here, i would like to have you say a few words. We want to learn everything we can learn, and we are going to go starting about 2 minutes after the meeting, we are going to work. This is a longterm situation we have to solve. We will solve it together. Youre gone through customer neri pain, and we dont want others to go through the kind of pain you have gone to. It wouldnt be right. Would you like to Say Something . Thank you, mr. President. My name is curtis kelly. I represent Thurgood Marshall academy here in the District Of Columbia. Vice president , madam secretary, thank you for having myself. My tragedy started september 20 of last year. I have two