Thursday, Aug. 15, 2019
Shannon Watts started demanding leaders take action after the Sandy Hook tragedy. All these years later, the founder of Moms Demand Action believes the tide is turning in favor of addressing America's gun violence epidemic, and she wants to keep the momentum going in the 2020 election.
"Do something" has been the cry across America in the weeks since the mass shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio.
At a vigil in Dayton, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine's speech was partly drowned out by many in the crowd shouting "Do something!"
— NPR (@NPR) August 5, 2019
That same call for action was heard at a pro soccer game in Washington, D.C.
And at Lollapalooza in Chicago.https://t.co/lXKxCs9ez8
It's a call that Shannon Watts answered after the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School. That tragedy turned Watts into an organizer on Facebook, which led to the founding of Moms Demand Action. With nearly 6 million members, Watts touts the group as "the NRA's worst nightmare."
While Washington has failed to meaningfully address gun violence in the years since Sandy Hook, Watts says there is momentum at the state and local levels, and her group and others are ready to make guns front and center in the 2020 election.
If you tell me we haven't made electoral progress on the issue of gun violence prevention, or that suburban women aren't engaged, or that this issue is intractable, I'm going to come at you like a spider monkey. https://t.co/yKeFIoyxoC
— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) August 12, 2019
GUEST
Shannon Watts, founder, Moms Demand Action; author of "Fight Like a Mother: How a Grassroots Movement Took on the Gun Lobby, and Why Women Will Change the World" (@shannonrwatts)
EVENT INFO
Ms. Watts will be appearing at a gun violence forum, Thursday, Aug. 28 at Johnson C. Smith University. The event has sold out.