A pro-gun group is responding to the March for Our Lives protest with a march of its own, planned for the same day, along the same route, directly preceding that of students and activists advocating for gun control.
Utah high school students favoring gun control plan to move their procession from West High School to a rally at the Capitol on March 24 at 11 a.m. as part of a national campaign called March for Our Lives.
The Utah Gun Exchange has announced a counterprotest dubbed March Before Our Lives, which the group planned after members were “excluded” from the original March, Utah Gun Exchange owner Bryan Melchior said.
Melchior said he’d been working with March for Our Lives representatives to join their rally, but his group was asked not to participate because its members’ views on guns don’t align with March for Our Lives’ cause.
“Our purpose for being there is that we care and love our children as well, and originally this march was a march in support of the lives and security of our children,” he said. “It has rapidly deteriorated to an anti-gun protest.”
A Facebook post about the March Before Our Lives encouraged counterprotesters to bring firearms to the rally.
Melchior’s group held a concealed-weapons class in the wake of the Feb. 14 massacre at a Florida high school, which sparked the March for Our Lives planning. Utah is one of at least eight states that don’t bar concealed firearms from public K-12 schools, The Associated Press has reported, and Melchior said his group will continue to provide free concealed-carry permits for teachers and people who work in the education system.
Madalena McNeil, a 25-year-old adviser to the students planning the March for Our Lives rally, said she had been in touch with Melchior about Utah Gun Exchange participating in the march, but that she never said the group couldn’t attend the original march.
She told Utah Gun Exchange — and other organizations that asked — that it couldn’t co-sponsor the event.
“And it didn’t make a lot of sense, especially because our mission statement says we want to remove military-grade weapons, and that is antithetical to what Utah Gun Exchange believes in,” McNeil said.
McNeil, who has a gun herself, also disagreed with Utah Gun Exchange’s characterization of the March for Our Lives as anti-gun, saying that asking for gun reform isn’t the same as stripping people of their Second Amendment rights.
According to a March Before Our Lives Facebook post, pro-gun activists will meet at West High School, 241 N. 300 West, about 10:40 a.m. to march in front of gun-control supporters “moments before their main march begins.”
The counterprotest’s description says: “We want to show that we are united in the call for change from our leaders, never again do we want our children vulnerable to attacks but until we can count on our leaders to protect our children WE will lead them.”
In a Facebook post on the March for Our Lives page, organizers asked marchers to stay civil and not antagonize the pro-gun demonstrators.
“We want this event to remain safe and peaceful for all participants, particularly since many of the attendees are high school students and younger,” the statement reads.
A volunteer safety team “trained in deescalation” and American Civil Liberties Union representatives will be on hand to monitor crowds, according to the post.
A Salt Lake City school district spokeswoman declined to comment on the competing protests and the individuals intending to bring guns to the West High School campus.
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