Free Republic

....Now the parents and partners of the victims are making that conversation their own, launching Stand With Parkland, the newest nonprofit group that's lobbying... ....this new endeavor is run by those who were most affected — the parents of 13 of the 14 student victims and family members of all three school staff members... ...Tony Montalto, father of 14-year-old Parkland victim Gina Montalto, told Rolling Stone that Stand With Parkland will be bipartisan. Although Democrats have traditionally been more supportive of gun control... ....the nonprofit’s launch garnered a response from the National Rifle Association. Chris W. Cox, director of the...

Full title: School Security Guard Who Didn’t Stop the Parkland Shooter Was Suspended for Sexually Harassing Students A disciplinary panel recommended Andrew Medina be fired. He was not. Lest you thought we were finished with tales of unfathomable incompetence on the part of Broward County, Florida, authority figures, consider this: The first Marjory Stoneman Douglas security guard who spotted Nikolas Cruz on campus and took no action to detain him was previously suspended for sexually harassing students. Due to his inaction during the shooting, Andrew Medina was initially reassigned to an administrative position elsewhere in the Broward County school system....

Constitutional lawyer and New York Times best-selling author Mark Smith combats David Hogg’s rhetoric in his latest book, “#Duped,” which serves as a response to the newly-minted gun-control activist and Parkland graduate’s recently released book, “#NeverAgain.” Smith exposes the left’s celebration and exploitation of students in order to advance so-called common sense gun control. “#Duped: How The Anti-Gun Lobby Exploits The Parkland School Shooting — And How Gun Owners Can Fight Back” deconstructs the progressive narrative and illustrates how advocates use children to promulgate an agenda that is so unpalatable they have failed to otherwise enact. Smith writes: From a...

The parent of a child killed in the Parkland shooting massacre ripped New Jersey state Senate President Stephen Sweeney on social media for not publicly supporting Gov. Phil Murphy's push to increase fees for buying and selling firearms in the state. The move, which Murphy has pressed for months, was part of the budget proposal the Democratic governor sent to legislative leaders from his own party in June. But it was not included in the budget passed by the state Senate and Assembly last week, leading to outcry from gun control advocates. Fred Guttenberg, whose daughter Jaime was killed in...

Lawmakers would bring students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School to Capitol Hill for the summer. Student survivors of gun violence descended on Washington en masse earlier this year during the massive March for Our Lives on March 24. Now some lawmakers would like to bring them back for an entire summer. House Democrats are inviting students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida — who survived a mass school shooting in February — to come intern in their offices, working on gun violence prevention....

.... town hall included David Hogg, the young man whose been one of the leaders of the movement following the Parkland shooting. Hogg was one of the panelist at the town hall meeting that in other students from Parkland and St. Louis students. Before arriving at Cardinal Ritter, Parkland students went to Ferguson to meet and speak with Michael Brown, Sr. the father of Michael Brown, Jr.

Wexler retired from the Secret Service in 2014 after 27 years with the agency. ~~~~~~~~~~~ He had offered in the past to make security recommendations. The district “finally took me up on the offer” in December when a teacher on behalf of the school’s security committee asked him to conduct a “site survey” of the campus. Was school security sufficient? they wanted to know. ~~~~~~~~~~ He said he printed out details about the school: its floor plan, bell schedule and an aerial map. Then he arrived early for his meeting Dec. 13 and pulled his truck into the visitor’s parking...

U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson introduced legislation this week that would create a national gun registry. Known as the “Crime Gun Tracing Modernization Act,” the bill would require ATF to set up a “searchable, computerized database” of all records pertaining to the sale, importation, production or shipment of firearms. The agency would be given three years to get the system up and running. “The fact that there is a law on the books that forces agents to comb through millions of files by hand is absolutely ridiculous,” said Nelson, a Florida Democrat.

The Florida government did not conduct background checks on thousands of applicants for concealed weapons for a year because the state employee was unable to log into the system. According to a February 2016 investigative report from Florida’s Inspector General, first reported by the Tampa Bay Times, a state Division of Licensing employee identified as Lisa Wilde was unable to log into the system to actually complete these background checks. She never mitigated this issue. When determining eligibility for purchasing a firearm, applicants must undergo a background check known as the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), which is...

David Hogg might not want to hold his breath while waiting for that $1 million donation from Publix. Two weeks after the 18-year-old student activist called on Publix to atone for supporting a pro-National Rifle Association candidate by sending $1 million to the Parkland victims’ fund, the grocery chain has shown no indication that it plans to do so. Publix spokeswoman Nicole Krauss confirmed that the company has not donated to the crowdfunding account, but highlighted the firm’s public-service activities at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, scene of the deadly Feb. 14 shooting. “While we have...

An unarmed security monitor in a golf cart was the first person to see Nikolas Cruz step out of an Uber, a large bag in hand, and stride toward Building 12 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High just before the worst school shooting in state history. Cruz, however, was no stranger to staff. "Nikolas Cruz. I knew the kid," security guard Andrew Medina told Broward detectives in a sworn video-recorded statement released by prosecutors on Tuesday evening. As soon as Cruz began walking "like on a mission" toward the building, Medina followed and began frantically texting fellow security guards. "We had...

School is out, and on Monday student activists at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School announced the next phase of their movement – a sweeping summer bus tour across 20 states to register young people to vote and campaign for deep reforms to the nation’s gun laws. “A lot of people have slowly been less excited about voting because people have been getting tired of the political system, but the thing is, we can fix the system,” Cameron Kasky, a Stoneman Douglas student and one of the key leaders of the March for Our Lives movement, said as he announced the...

The disgraced Florida sheriff’s deputy who stayed outside as 17 people were slaughtered inside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School maintained Tuesday that he was “never” a coward — as parents of slain students railed at him for trying to paint himself as a victim. “The families need to know. I didn’t get it right. But it wasn’t because of some, ‘Oh, I don’t wanna go into that building, oh, I don’t wanna face somebody in there.’ It wasn’t like that at all,” Scot Peterson said on NBC’s “Today” show Tuesday. “I’m never gonna get over this, you know,” he said....

The disgraced Florida sheriff’s deputy who stayed outside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School as a killer stalked its halls has spent the 90 days since the massacre wondering why he failed to save lives, according to a report. “It’s haunting,” Scot Peterson said in a Washington Post report published Monday. “I’ve cut that day up a thousand ways with a million different what-if scenarios, but the bottom line is I was there to protect, and I lost 17.” Since the Valentine’s Day attack at the Parkland school — where 17 people were killed and 17 more injured — Peterson has...

Medina was the first to see Nikolas Cruz step onto the Parkland campus on Feb. 14. He tuned into the 19-year-old getting out of a gold-colored Uber and striding purposefully toward the 1200 building. “He’s beelining. He’s got his head down. He’s on a mission, you know. He’s on a mission,” Medina later told investigators. Medina radioed ahead to a fellow campus monitor assigned to that building to warn him that a suspicious kid — who Medina did not suspect was carrying a gun in his duffel bag — was heading for the east-side entrance. Cruz broke into a run...

Confessed Florida school shooter "POS" said in cell phone video recorded before the Feb. 14 massacre that “I’m going to be the next school shooter of 2018,” according to footage released by prosecutors on Wednesday.

Could the Parkland, FL shooter have made his motivations any clearer?

David Hogg is trying to shake down Publix. The public face of the gun control movement demanded $1 million Thursday from the Florida-based grocery chain in a tweet, just one day after calling for a “die-in” protest at its stores. Publix is being targeted by Mr. Hogg for its support of Adam Putnam, a Republican gubernatorial candidate who is now the state’s agricultural commissioner. The Tampa Bay Times reported earlier this week that Publix had given $670,000 during the last three years to Putnam campaigns. Mr. Hogg not only sought atonement money from the grocery chain in Thursday’s tweet, he...

Andrew Pollack lost his daughter Meadow in the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Instead of waiting for lawmakers and school officials to agree on the appropriate response to the tragedy, he's getting to work on his own initiative. He shared information about his new Children’s Lives and School Safety campaign on social media last week. Unlike Parkland student activists who have spent their time demonizing the NRA and rejecting recent congressional efforts to boost school security because the bills don't mention the word "gun," Pollack supported the STOP School Violence Act. The bipartisan legislation improves communication between local...

Staring down the prospect of a public relations crisis — boycott threats and "die-in" protests included — over its donations to Republican gubernatorial hopeful Adam Putnam, Publix said Friday it has halted all corporate political contributions. The supermarket giant made the announcement moments before a "die-in" protest planned by David Hogg, a vocal Parkland school shooting survivor and gun control activist. Despite the news, Hogg and dozens of protestors sprawled on the floor of a Coral Springs Publix for 12 minutes clutching sunflowers and signs that read "No NRA Money." Hogg and other students began their influential movement for gun...