Local opinion: Politicians hiding behind the 2nd Amendment

I am a gunshot wound survivor of the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival mass shooting, where 60 people were killed and 413 others suffered gunshot wounds.

As I learn more about the details of the most recent mass shooting at Florida State University where two people were killed and six others injured, I am once again struggling to understand how our president and so many of our lawmakers can hide behind the Second Amendment and normalize the existence of gun violence in our society.

On the campaign trail, President Trump was asked, “Could you explain your gun control policy to parents of victims of school shootings?” His response was, “We have a Second Amendment right to bear arms and I’m very strongly an advocate of that.” He went on to say, “You wouldn’t be able to take away the guns, because people need them for security. They need them for entertainment, and for sports and for other things.”

President Trump has no right to reduce gun violence survivors and victims’ to forms of entertainment. I am a human being who should never have found myself in the midst of a war zone because our country allows people to purchase assault rifles and modify them with bump stocks.

In the wake of the shooting at Florida State University, President Trump doubled down on his defense of the Second Amendment saying, “I am a big advocate of the Second Amendment. These things are terrible, but the gun doesn’t do the shooting-the people do.”

I want to know, President Trump, who is protecting the rights of students like Stephanie Horwitz and Logan Rubenstein and others like them who survived the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland Florida (17 deaths, 18 injuries) only to have to live through the horror of another mass shooting on their university campus. These students should have the right to never have to experience being hunted by a gun-wielding assailant. They not only had to live through it once but twice. Shame on all of us for allowing this to happen by continuing to elect lawmakers who say they cannot pass gun sense laws because of the Second Amendment.

Who, President Trump, is protecting the rights of Lori Alhadeff? Lori’s daughter, Alyssa, was killed at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School mass shooting. She also had to endure the agony of receiving the call that another child of hers was in danger as a mass shooting was unfolding at her son’s college campus. No parent should have to experience the hell associated with gun violence once in their lifetime and certainly not twice.

Why is it not your responsibility, President Trump, and that of the lawmakers we elect to protect the rights of all of us who are sick and tired of gun violence being a norm in our society.

President Trump and so many politicians prioritize the rights of gun owners at the expense of those of us who simply want to live in a society where gun sense laws are passed that keep gun violence tragedies from destroying lives.

Two examples of the dangerous legislation that is currently being supported by these types of lawmakers at the Arizona state level are SB1020, which allows concealed carrying of guns on Arizona public colleges and universities and SB1143 which prohibits the use of a merchant category code distinguishing a firearm retailer from other types of retailers. If these bills are put into law, more innocent lives will be shattered by gun violence. Contact your lawmakers and tell them you oppose both of these dangerous bills.

It is time the complacency ends, and we demand that our lawmakers stop supporting laws that put people at risk and instead pass gun sense laws that will keep innocent people from being killed, wounded, and psychologically damaged by gun violence in our country.