March For Our Lives plans town hall event

The student organizers of “The March for Our Lives” rally announced Thursday plans to hold a town hall event in Georgia to discuss gun laws in the wake of the Feb. 14 mass shooting in Parkland, Fla.

The “Town Hall for Our Lives” is scheduled for Saturday from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Rialto Center for the Arts in Atlanta. A finalized list of guests and speakers will be released prior to the event, but elected officials are expected to attend. 

Organizers said the event will focus on “conversations about gun reform and will serve as a forum for community dialogue to discuss ways to reduce gun violence.”

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Two other town hall events are scheduled for Saturday afternoon in other parts of Georgia with one other yet to be scheduled.

One will take place in Georgia’s 4th Congressional District in Conyers, which is represented by Rep. Hank Johnson (D). Johnson is expected to attend.

Another is slated for Georgia’s 9th Congressional District, which is represented by Rep. Doug Collins (R). Collins is not listed among the scheduled attendees.

A third town hall, in Georgia’s 11th Congressional District, has yet to be scheduled.

Students have been prominent voices in the recently renewed debate over the nation’s gun laws, which was sparked by the February shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. That shooting left 17 people dead and several others injured.

The students organized the “March for Our Lives,” which drew more than 1 million attendees to rallies across the nation that called for an end to gun violence.

Since the shooting, the Trump administration has taken steps to ban bump stocks, an accessory that allows certain weapons to fire at a more rapid rate, signed off on funding for improved background checks and urged states to pass some other gun laws.

A number of states have also acted to pass laws tightening restrictions, while some legislatures have moved toward securing schools or allowing staff and teachers to bring guns to school.

Congress has not taken action on enacting universal background checks or raising the age requirement to purchase a rifle or banning assault weapons, each of which Parkland students have called for.