The national student-led campaign for gun control came to the Twin Cities Sunday as survivors of the Valentine's Day school shooting in Parkland, Fla., and their local allies registered young voters in Minneapolis and held an emotional town hall meeting in Osseo.
The visiting March for Our Lives activists included David Hogg and Cameron Kasky, both high-profile survivors of the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that killed 17 people. On Sunday afternoon, young people flocked to register to vote when they arrived at the OutFront booth at the Pride festival at Loring Park.
Their bus didn't make it to Minneapolis quite in time for the Parkland students to march in the midday Pride parade as planned. But Minnesotans from Students Demand Action, Moms Demand Action and West Metro Walkout received a warm welcome as they marched on behalf of the March for Our Lives.
Paton Buller, a student at Mountain Lake High School, a nearly three-hour drive from downtown Minneapolis, marched in the parade. Buller helped organize an April student walkout at his school.
"There was nothing wrong in our school till two people were expelled after they threatened other students with guns in December," he said.
"More than myself, I am worried about my three siblings who go to elementary school."
The Minnesota visit of the Road to Change bus tour Sunday through Tuesday is part of a 20-state March for Our Lives campaign.
Its leaders chose Minnesota as one of the 20 stops of the bus tour, which started June 14 in Chicago, because state voters go to the polls in November to elect their next governor, U.S. senators and representatives, state representatives, judges and other state and local officials.