Community holds rally in support of gun control in Davidson

DAVIDSON, N.C. — Local organizers held a rally in support of gun control on Sunday afternoon in Davidson.

The rally comes after another deadly weekend in the United States, with three major mass shootings in three states within the past 24 hours, in Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Tennessee.

Organizers started to plan the rally a couple of weeks ago in the wake of the tragedy in Uvalde, Texas.

The people who attended the rally said the problem is access to guns.

Community members told Channel 9′s Glenn Counts that they want to see an assault weapons ban, enhanced background checks, and an increase in the age of purchase from 18 to 21 years old.

“We wanted to meet and gather publicly to commemorate the victims and think a little bit about what we may do moving forward out by way of action,” organizer Greg Snyder said.

Part of the program at the rally involved reading the names of the mass shooting victims in Tulsa, Oklahoma; Uvalde,Texas; and Buffalo, New York.

That moment meant a lot for Darnella Reeder, who lives in Charlotte but is from Buffalo. Two of Reeder’s cousins were killed in the mass shooting at a Buffalo grocery store.

“It meant more than anybody could ever know to kind of represent, to keep their names alive,” Reeder said.

Reeder said it’s important to realize that every victim had a family and a life just like us.

“It’s so easy for us to go back to our day to day lives and continually start to forget more and more that there are real people with real families,” Reeder said.

Leslie Cosentine, one of the teachers of 15-year-old John Daniel Morales who was killed by two other teens during Memorial Day weekend, was at the rally.

“My reason is was just crying out enough was enough, for Uvalde, and then Tulsa and then John,” Cosentine said.

The participants said their goal was to force change for the long haul.

Christy Clark, with the organization Moms Demand Action, said she believes the problem may be rooted in politics.

“When legislators are making decisions about a gun bill, they are not thinking with their heart, They are thinking with the dollars that the NRA has given to them,” Clark said.

Participants said the rally was the first step in defeating those politicians at the ballot box.

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