NEW YORK – Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund and ATTN: today released a video urging Americans to vote for gun safety candidates next week featuring Sari Kaufman, a junior who survived the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School; Julvonnia McDowell, whose 14-year-old son, JaJuan McDowell, was unintentionally shot by another teen playing with a gun in 2016; and Scott Cooper, a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps who is a member of the Everytown Veterans Advisory Council.
The video urges Americans to vote for gun sense candidates in honor of the 96 Americans who are shot and killed every day and the hundreds more who are wounded. This election, more than 3,000 candidates in red, blue and purple states have run on gun safety platforms, and the video directs voters to gunsensevoter.org to find these candidates who will stand for gun safety in elected office.
“On Election Day, we need to vote as if our lives depend on it — because they do,” said John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety. “Anyone who is still looking for a reason to vote should watch this video.”
“If you’re old enough to vote and don’t plan to, you need to change your mind right now,” said Sari Kaufman, a 16-year-old junior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas and volunteer leader with Students Demand Action. “Vote in the name of my 17 friends and classmates who were killed at my high school.”
“I don’t want another parent, another mother, to have to shed these tears,” said Julvonnia McDowell, a volunteer with the Georgia chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America and a member of the Everytown Survivor Network. “Please vote to honor my son and keep shootings like his from happening again.”
“I served for more than 20 years in the military. I carried an M9 and M16 around Iraq and Afghanistan,” said Scott Cooper, a member of the Everytown Veterans Advisory Council. “I also support strong gun safety laws.”