'Moms Demand Action' Conference Turns Into Massive March
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Activists from Minnesota say what happened this weekend is a reminder that change is needed. The Minnesota Chapter of Moms Demand Action was in Washington D.C. for a national conference on gun safety during the shootings.
Moms Demand Action leader Molly Leutz flew home to Minnesota from Washington D.C.-- after the end of an annual conference on gun safety turned into a massive march Saturday night.
Two-thousand activists were in the streets of the nation's capital showing support for El Paso after news of another mass shooting.
"And in the morning we learn not just Dayton, and not just these tragedies that become one name, but also the hundred people who die every single day in the United States by gun violence," Leutz said.
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz spoke of the mass shootings while at an event in St. Paul Sunday.
"Every single one of us knows not 'if' it's 'when' this thing happens again, and that is simply unacceptable," he said.
Leutz says they would like to see universal background checks on every gun purchase, as well as 'red flag laws' allowing police or family members to petition the courts to temporarily remove a firearm from someone. But gun safety reform measures in Minnesota failed to get past a public safety conference committee this spring during the legislative session.
"We can be sad, we can be mad, we can be frustrated-- we can take a break, we can take care of ourselves-- but we will keep showing up," Leutz said.