[Image URL: [link removed]]

Hi John,

Today marks 27 years since I lost my brother Arnie. Twenty-seven years since my brother, another student, and a teacher were killed in a horrific school shooting at Frontier Jr. High School in Moses Lake, Washington.

Sadly, I know the excruciating details of what happened to Arnie and his classmates. I know that they dove under their desks for protection. I know that they pleaded with the shooter to stop. I know that they begged to carry my brother to safety. I know that a heroic teacher tackled the shooter. I know that my brother took his final breaths without any feeling of safety.

Shootings like the one that killed my brother are the ones that make the headlines. But it is the daily toll of community violence, which hits BIPOC communities hardest, and the nearly silent epidemic of suicide by firearm, which accounts for nearly two-thirds of all gun deaths, that leaves far more families grieving.

I am fortunate that I am able to channel my grief into action by leading the Alliance for Gun Responsibility. And I am proud of what we have been able to accomplish. In Washington, we have raised the age to purchase semi-automatic assault rifles, restricted high-capacity magazines, incentivized safe storage, created some of the strongest domestic violence protections in the country, and committed significant funding to violence intervention programs. We have written a playbook that other states and the federal government are finally starting to follow. With your help, we will keep working tirelessly to hold our federal elected officials accountable.

As I remember Arnie today, I will do so with sorrow and hope, but also with a dedication to demand action with every breath I have left.

Renée
(she/her)

P.S. If you’d like to honor Arnie’s memory this National Gun violence Survivors Week, you can support our work to prevent gun violence in all of its forms here: [link removed].



Manage your subscriptions or unsubscribe here:

unsubscribe: [link removed]