Gun Violence Prevention
On March 27, a mass shooting at a school in Nashville left three children and three adults dead. CAMP Rehoboth and Moms Demand Action of Everytown condemn this violence and had a conversation about how to engage the community ahead of Moms Demand Action’s presence at the Women’s FEST Expo on Saturday, April 29.
Mara Gorman, who spoke with us, has been the volunteer state chapter lead for Moms Demand Action in Delaware since 2021. Before that, Gorman was the legislative and election volunteer lead for the group in Delaware.
Gorman reports that Moms Demand Action is the largest gun safety grassroots organization in the country. “We have over 10 million volunteers and chapters in every state and DC,” said Gorman. She added that Delaware holds four groups; they are in the Greater Wilmington area, Newark, Dover, and the “Beaches” group (encompassing Rehoboth, Lewes, and Bethany), which kickstarted last fall.
CAMP Rehoboth: What is the mission of Moms Demand Action?
Mara Gorman: As a national organization our mission is multifaceted. We work to pass gun safety legislation, educate the community about responsible gun ownership, and elect candidates who prioritize gun safety. This past election we had over 30 gun sense candidates win their elections and support survivors of gun violence. Finally, we work with survivors, so we have networks of support for survivors or anyone who identifies as a survivor of gun violence. That’s also very core to our work. It’s one of the biggest things I’ve learned as chapter lead: every day, 120 Americans are killed by guns—tragically, so many people in our country identify as survivors of gun violence.
CR: In light of the recent Nashville shooting, what has Moms Demand Action seen regarding reports that guns are now the primary killer of children?
MG: In Delaware, guns are the top killer of children, and in particular Black and Brown children, who are disproportionately impacted. Among children and teens, 88 percent of all gun deaths are homicides in Delaware. So we know children are being shot, not shooting themselves.
We live in a state where there are as many children killed by guns as are killed by car accidents. With car accidents, a national program was enacted to encourage safe driving and stop drunk driving. It seems like it would be prudent to take similar action here [with gun safety].
Gun violence has really big impacts beyond the people it harms and kills. It has mental health impacts on all of the children who see it and witness it and live with it every day. That can have really adverse impacts on them in terms of their mental health, their success at school, and a whole host of issues that come along with this issue. That is why it is also important to ensure that our community violence intervention programs that offer a wide range of services, including mental health services, receive sustainable funding
CR: In a statement you applauded Governor John Carney for passing and signing into law a comprehensive package of gun safety bills. You also spoke about the House’s failure to pass permit-to-purchase legislation. Can you say more about this?
MG: Last summer, after the horrible shooting in Uvalde, Texas, we were very lucky that the Delaware legislature took action and passed a slate of bills, including a bill that raised the minimum age to purchase a firearm to 21, a ban of so-called assault weapons in Delaware, and one that increased industry accountability among other things. That was very significant and strengthened our laws to the point that when Everytown for Gun Safety, which is the parent organization and research wing of Moms Demand Action, did their report card of states and their laws, they rated Delaware 11th. Of course, as chapter lead, I would love to see us in the top 10, especially because our neighbors New Jersey and Maryland are there.
There was a permit to purchase a handgun bill that was passed by the State Senate. Unfortunately, it did not pass both chambers and this is something we will be advocating for this legislative session. There are multiple reasons we know why passing a permitting bill would help save lives in Delaware. A permitting bill lessens both homicides and suicides.
Permitting bills ensure that there are the right safety measures in place, such as requiring fingerprinting and training on both storage and use of a firearm. They make it a little bit slower to get a gun. It wouldn’t stop people from getting guns. But it would mean that a person could not immediately access a gun and give someone a chance to rethink their actions or seek help.
The ban on assault weapons is very important, and we’re so glad that it was passed, but that is not going to prevent most of the gun deaths in Delaware. More people die by deaths from a handgun than by an assault weapon. I’m not sure if anyone recently has died in Delaware from an assault weapon.
CR: The Nashville shooter was a transgender woman, and we’ve noticed greater attention there. How does gender identity factor into these discussions?
MG: While extremist lawmakers will try to use the shooter’s identity as fuel for their hateful agenda, we know that transgender and gender nonconforming people are far more likely to be victims of gun violence than perpetrators. Between 2017 and 2022, there were 222 homicides of transgender or gender nonconforming people. Seventy-four percent of these were with a gun. Black trans women face the bulk of this violence. Forty-five percent of LGBTQ+ youth have seriously considered a suicide attempt in the past year and nearly one in five transgender and nonbinary youth have attempted suicide.
CR: Moms Demand Action will have a presence at Women’s FEST. What can we expect?
MG: We are very excited. We will have lots of information for people. Plus swag because everyone loves that—the pins, bracelets, buttons, and everything. Our color is bright red, so we will be very noticeable. We’ll have information on what kinds of action you can take, how you can join the group as a volunteer, and what kinds of programs we run.
For instance, we have a group called Be Smart, which is all about educating families about secure storage and normalizing the conversation around secure storage for people who are not gun owners. We will have information about what is happening politically. We’ll be telling people to send your representatives and senators postcards or emails or call them depending on what we see happening around the legislation we want passed. We’ll also have information on how to get involved with helping survivors. The beginning of June is National Survivors Day—we call that Wear Orange—and we’ll have some events going on with that. At the very least, they can find out how to get involved in a meeting and find out where the next meeting is and how they can join that way.
CR: Where else can folks find Moms Demand Action?
MG: We will also be at Delaware Pride in Dover. Our program for Pride Month will be called “Disarm Hate.” We usually do observances of the Pulse Nightclub shooting, and we’ll have rainbow signs that say, “disarm hate.” If people don’t have the opportunity to see us at Women’s FEST, they can see us there.
We’re very excited to work with CAMP Rehoboth because we know how vulnerable the LGBTQ+ community is to both homicide and suicide, especially young people and young people of color. That matters enormously to us and we want to bring awareness to that fact, to lift up your community, to be true allies to the work you’re doing, and make sure that everyone is safe. That’s our top priority. Every Delawarean is a neighbor and it’s very important to make sure everyone is safe from a gun.
CR: What else is important to know regarding this issue?
MG: The important thing to know is how pervasive gun violence is. It’s a uniquely American problem. Other developed nations don’t have nearly the amount of gun violence that we do here. And it’s a preventable problem. I think there’s been a lot of work to make it seem like this is somehow inevitable and this is the cost of living in a free society. Our society isn’t free if we’re at risk of being shot at the movies, in the grocery store, or place of worship, or truly anywhere.
I think a lot of people think of gun violence as these national events, but people in Delaware are dying from gun violence every day. I think shifting our view to a more holistic view is important to really understanding and changing things. We have to start with the root causes of gun violence, which are a lot of other societal problems, starting with poverty, education, lack of housing, lack of jobs, and bigotry, racism, homophobia, all of those things. It’s an intersectional problem that’s the responsibility of all of us to fix. That’s the mission of Moms Demand Action: to help people to see that and to work with every constituency to make us all safer. ▼
Matty Brown is Communications Manager at CAMP Rehoboth and editorial associate for Letters from CAMP Rehoboth.
Photo: Nic Neufeld, Shutterstock