March For Our Lives organizers: 'This time is different' in the fight for gun safety measures

Updated at 10 a.m. on June 10

In the wake of several recent mass shootings, including the shooting in Uvalde, Texas at an elementary school, local March For Our Lives organizers from the student-led group say the tides may be finally turning in the fight to end gun violence.

"We are here to show that we are the generation that can end gun violence," said Charlotte Vincent, a March For Our Lives organizer in Boston. She is one of many advocates across the country working to organize a march on June 11. More than 400 marches are already planned, including one that will take place at Boston's Christopher Columbus Waterfront Park.

"We really firmly believe that this time is different," Vincent said. "We are here to demand that Senator Schumer calls a vote on universal background checks at this moment in time to get lawmakers on the record for something that over 90% of Americans support."

Jaclyn Corin, a March For Our Lives co-founder and Parkland shooting survivor, said she is still traumatized over what she experienced, and lives with survivor's guilt every day. "I can't go anywhere without fearing that someone is carrying a gun behind me," she said.

Corin helped organize the first March For Our Lives events after the 2018 Parkland shooting, which prompted a record-breaking number of local gun safety laws that were passed in states across the nation. However, very little has changed on a federal level.

Getting more laws passed on a federal level will need to include a key politician — Mitch McConnell, who Corin said, "gets his pockets stuffed with money from the National Rifle Association." McConnell recently told a journalist gun violence solutions should center on mental health resources and school safety.

Corin said she hopes the marches will motivate people to elect politicians that will "actually care about people dying."

Watch: March For Our Lives organizers say ‘this time is different’ in push for gun safety

This web article was updated to list the new location for Boston's March For Our Lives. The event will now be at Christopher Columbus Waterfront Park, not Boston Common.