Thousands of students across the US are walking out of their schools to protest gun violence and push for change after the Florida shooting
- Students across the country are rallying for stricter gun-control measures after a mass shooting in Florida last week killed 17 people.
- Students planned school walkouts and staged protests and rallies in Tallahassee, Florida and Washington, DC.
- Lawmakers are under pressure to act on gun-control measures, and President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he intended to ban "bump stock" devices for semi-automatic firearms.
Students across the United States walked out of their schools en masse Wednesday in a nationwide protest against gun violence following last week's mass shooting in Florida that killed 17 people.
Dozens of students from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland joined hundreds of their peers from across Florida to descend on the state Capitol, enraged that Republican state lawmakers dismissed a bill banning assault rifles and high-capacity magazines on Tuesday.
"We're what's making the change. We're going to talk to these politicians," Alfonso Calderon, one of the shooting survivors, told CBS News. "We're going to keep pushing until something is done, because people are dying and this can't happen anymore."
"After the Parkland, Florida shooting, we students can no longer stay silent on the issue of gun violence in the United States," Maryland student Daniel Gelillo said in a statement announcing the event. "Far too many innocent lives have been taken in these slaughters, all because of the easy access and availability of guns in general and assault weapons in particular."
Students have also planned a national school walkout on March 14, followed by a "March for Our Lives" protest on March 24.
Lawmakers appear to be under greater pressure than ever to enact gun-control measures, and public opinion polls show American voters are increasingly favoring stricter gun laws.
President Donald Trump announced Tuesday he had directed the Justice Department to ban "bump stock" devices used in last year's mass shooting in Las Vegas, and he indicated he'd be open to improving the federal background-check system.