Dear Commons Community,

Tens of thousands of people rallied in the nation’s capital and other cities across the U.S. yesterday to demand stronger gun control.

“Enough is enough,” Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser told a crowd at the second March for Our Lives rally in her city. “I speak as a mayor, a mom, and I speak for millions of Americans and America’s mayors who are demanding that Congress do its job. And its job is to protect us, to protect our children from gun violence.”

The first March for Our Lives rally was held in 2018 following a school shooting in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 people dead. This week’s events were organized by March for Our Lives co-founder and Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg after last month’s school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

In the Texas shooting, 19 children and two teachers were killed by an 18-year-old armed with an AR-15. Police waited more than an hour before entering the classroom to confront the shooter, in part because they feared for their own safety. An Uvalde pediatrician told Congress this week that the bullets tore apart the bodies of the children and left some of them decapitated.

“If our government can’t do anything to stop 19 kids from being killed and slaughtered in their own school, and decapitated, it’s time to change who is in government,” Hogg told a D.C. crowd.

The Uvalde shooter obtained his AR-15 legally the day after he turned 18. Earlier this week, the House of Representatives approved a package of gun control bills that would in part raise the age requirement for most rifle sales from 18 to 21.

Rallies were scheduled in more than 400 U.S. cities in nearly all 50 states, according to the March for Our Lives website.

Tony