March for Our Lives, the gun control advocacy group started after the 2018 Parkland shooting, endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, the organization’s first endorsement of an elected official ever.
“The stakes couldn’t possibly be higher in this election. Trump has shown us time and time again who he is: A dangerous demagogue who wants to take us back in time, strip us of our rights, and give a blank check over to the extremist gun lobby. We can’t let that happen,” the group wrote in a statement released on its website. “We need someone to stand up boldly to him and his cronies and fight for our lives tooth and nail. A proven fighter and a bold thinker who can inspire young people and create the future that we KNOW we deserve.”
The statement went on, “That’s why we’re pleased to make our first endorsement EVER: March for Our Lives endorses Kamala Harris for President of the United States.”
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The group listed their grievances that influenced their decision: “gun violence remains the leading cause of death for young people for the third year in a row, the war in Gaza... the climate crisis... and far-right politicians... pushing one of the most extremist agendas in our country’s history,” referencing Project 2025.
The organization also flexed Harris’ bona fides as the director of the newly minted White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention.
“Since becoming Vice President, she has met regularly with advocates and survivors of gun violence, and we’ve had the pleasure of working with her as she’s led the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention,” the group wrote.
The organization also believes “that Kamala will step above that and fight for a bold, progressive future—and we will hold her accountable to that.”
March For Our Lives’ spokesperson Ryan Barto told the Daily Beast that the organization does not “coordinate with the campaign,” adding they have “nothing in terms of necessarily appointments” when asked whether the Harris campaign had agreed to any cabinet picks or policy agenda that March for Our Lives had advocated.
“We call on her to run a campaign that fights for the policy solutions that young people want, like an assault weapons ban, action on climate change, a vigorous defense of abortion, court reform, and an immediate and lasting ceasefire in Gaza,” the organization added in the statement.
Barto said that their endorsement of Harris and their lack thereof for President Joe Biden in 2020 was a confluence of the organization’s non-profit status and that Biden has been “a staunch ally.”
“He has been, you know, obviously one of the most progressive presidents of our lifetime who has done most for gun violence prevention,” Barto said of Biden.
The National Firearms Trade Association has been highly critical of the White House Office of Gun Violence saying “The office will have little to do with preventing actual crime and everything to do with using taxpayer dollars to attempt to deny Americans their Second Amendment rights,” in reaction to its announcement in 2023.
The National Rifle Association called the office an “unnecessary and politically-charged appendages to the federal bureaucracy: that it spend money while doing and accomplishing nothing.”
