John,

Last week, five students were wounded in a shooting at Morgan State University in Maryland. My heart goes out to those affected during what was supposed to be a homecoming week celebration.

The students at Morgan State deserve better. They deserve to get an education and celebrate with their classmates without fear of someone with a gun inflicting carnage on a crowd.

A new report from Everytown for Gun Safety shows that there have been over 100 incidents of gun violence on school grounds this year. Let that sink in for a moment.

In fact, firearms are now the leading cause of death for children and teens in the United States according to the CDC.

John, why should we have to live like this? We know that there are common-sense solutions to our epidemic of gun violence. High-powered weapons of war shouldn’t be legal, period.

We are where we are today because Republican politicians refuse to pass the legislation required to address this crisis. They cash checks from the NRA while ignoring the bloodshed in our own communities.

When you lose a loved one to gun violence, it changes you forever. I do this work in honor of all the families who are in that position, and my mission is to make sure that no mother has to feel the way I felt when Jordan was killed.

Change won’t happen overnight, but I promise the victims at Morgan State – and in other shootings across the country – that I won’t stop fighting for them.

Onward,

Lucy