March For Our Lives Event For Gun Reform June 11 In Metro Detroit

METRO DETROIT — Thousands will gather in Washington D.C. and cities across the country on Saturday, June 11 to demonstrate the need to reform the nation's gun laws.

In addition to the "March for Our Lives" protest in D.C., there are several marches planned in the metro Detroit area, including in Oxford, where authorities said a 15-year-old student opened fire at Oxford High School last November, killing four students and wounding seven other people.

The demonstration in Oxford will take place on Saturday, June 11 at 9:30 a.m. at Centennial Park, 25 S Washington St. There will also be a protest planned in Downtown Detroit at 12 p.m. at the Detroit Cities Riverfront, 1340 Atwater St.

The demonstrations come after the latest school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24 that resulted in a profound loss of lives.

Nineteen children between the ages of 9 and 11, and two of their teachers, were killed inside a fourth grade classroom at Robb Elementary as law enforcement officers waited for more than an hour outside, according to reports. Justice Department investigators are expected to focus their probe on police response to the shooting.

March for Our Lives organizers’ immediate goal is to pressure elected officials to "step up and pass universal background checks" in the U.S. Senate. The House approved a bipartisan background check bill in 2019, but it has since languished in the Senate.

"No more time. It’s time Democrats, Republicans, gun owners and non-gun owners come together and stop focusing on what we can’t agree on and start focusing on what we can even if small," activist David Hogg said on Twitter. Hogg was 17 in 2018 when 14 of his fellow students and three staff members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School were killed by an 18-year-old gunman with an assault-style weapon.

"We’re doing another march on June 11 sign up here and help us make this time different," he continued, alluding to previous times when gun law reforms failed to materialize from national outrage over a mass shooting.

Michigan House Republicans recently blocked a renewed gun safety package pushed Wednesday by state Democrats that would mandate universal background checks on all gun sales, allow local governments to ban guns on property they own or lease, and, in some cases, prohibiting the sale or possession of a magazine capable of holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition.

"We absolutely need to do the bare minimum today to keep firearms out of the hands of young people," Birmingham Democrat Rep. Mari Manoogian said.

However, the state Senate voted along party lines and rejected the proposal in a 22-14 vote.

"We can have the conversations, have an honest conversation over what needs to be done with these bills whatsoever," Frankenmuth Republican Sen. Ken Horn said. "But these families are grieving. They are still at a point where the weight is so heavy on their chest that they can't breathe."

In a prime-time address Thursday, President Joe Biden outlined a far more ambitious and politically difficult proposal that includes expanded background checks. He also called for the restoration of a ban on assault-style weapons and high-capacity magazines, one he helped pass as a senator in 1994 and that Congress allowed to sunset in 2004.

Failing that, Congress should at least find a way to keep those military-style weapons out of the hands of those with mental health issues, or raise the minimum age to buy them from 18 to 21, Biden said.

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“How much more carnage are we willing to accept?” Biden said. “Don’t tell me raising the age won’t make a difference.”

He called on Congress to end "outrageous" protections for gun manufacturers, which severely limit their liability over how their firearms are used, comparing it to the tobacco industry, which has faced repeated litigation over its products' role in causing cancer and other diseases.

"Imagine if the tobacco industry had been immune from being sued, where we'd be today," Biden said.

If Congress doesn’t act, voters should show their outrage and turn gun control into a bellwether issue in November’s midterm elections, Biden said.

A secondary goal for March for Our Lives organizers is to push young voters to the polls in the November midterm elections, a strategy that worked in the 2018 midterms. Its 2018 march, held just over a month after the Parkland massacre when anti-gun fervor was high, fueled a 47 percent increase in young voter turnout from the 2014 midterms.

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It was the highest youth vote turnout ever, increasing in every state, according to a Tufts University analysis. In a first, Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun-reform lobbying group backed by billionaire Michael Bloomberg, outspent the National Rifle Association in federal elections, according to The Trace, a news organization that investigates gun violence.

More than two dozen NRA-backed candidates lost their House seats, and the new Democratic majority included at least 17 newly elected representatives who favor stricter gun laws, according to CNBC.

March for Our Lives said voters made clear in 2018 “the status quo was no longer acceptable” by kicking a record number of NRA-backed candidates out of federal and state policymaking offices.

The Uvalde school shooting was the 27th of 2022, according to Education Week, an independent news organization that covers K-12 education and has been tracking school shootings since 2018. In that time, 88 people have been killed and 229 others have been injured in 119 school shootings.

Gun violence overall has spiked to the point that it’s a public health crisis, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which earlier this year reported a near-record-high number of gun-related deaths in the United States in 2020.

An analysis of that data shows firearms were the leading cause of death among children for the first time in 2020.

The Associated Press contributed reporting.