David Hogg and Emma Gonzalez, two students who survived last month’s mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, said Monday that the National Rifle Association has been “basically threatening” them.
Mr. Hogg and Ms. Gonzalez, who came to national prominence after repeatedly attacking the NRA and pushing for stricter gun control laws in the wake of the Feb. 14 massacre, told CBS News that the NRA had recently reached out to them.
“The way that they’ve been reaching out to us is basically threatening us,” Mr. Hogg said.
“They’ve been instigating things,” Ms. Gonzalez added. “And then, when we reply, they, like, shy back away. They can dish it out but they can’t take it.”
The pair didn’t expand on what the NRA allegedly did to constitute a threat.
“I think it just goes to prove what exactly they are,” Mr. Hogg said. “I don’t think NRA members are bad people at all. I think they’re responsible gun owners that want to become politically active and make their voices heard in this democracy, and I think that’s an excellent thing.
“I think the problem comes in when it’s people at the top of this organization that don’t listen to their constituents and continue to scare people into buying more guns, creating more violence, so they can scare more people and sell more guns,” he added. “The people at the top of the NRA are no longer working for the people that are in their organization. They’re working on behalf of the gun lobby.”
Both Mr. Hogg and Ms. Gonzalez said they’ve received death threats in response to their activism.
“There’s always been people who are going to want to harm us,” Ms. Gonzalez said. “I’m not going to pretend that this like opened my eyes to a cruel and harmful world. … When it comes right down to it, we already knew that this world was going to be tough. So getting death threats like that doesn’t really faze us.”
The NRA has not yet responded to the students’ criticism.
Thousands of students are preparing to march on the nation’s capital this weekend in support of more gun control following a nationwide school walkout last week that was organized by Youth Empower, a division of the left-wing national organization Women’s March.
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