LANSING, Mich. — More than 100 Michigan State University students sat in lines Wednesday in front of the state Capitol, mimicking the positions they’ve adopted in lockdown drills throughout their education two days after a shooting on the university’s campus.
The shooting claimed the lives of three students and injured five others who are being cared for at Sparrow Hospital, a facility visible one mile down on Michigan Avenue from where the students held their sit-in.
The protest comes as Michigan Democratic lawmakers now in the majority have promised immediate action on gun regulation legislation. Lawmakers are crafting bills that would require stricter universal background checks for handgun purchases, a safe gun storage law and a red flag law that would allow police to petition a judge to temporarily take away weapons from individuals deemed a threat to themselves or others. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer last month called for those gun regulations in her State of the State address.
Paige Lawson, a second-year student at MSU, was at Case Hall when the shooting started and left to drive home unaware of the ongoing incident.
“No more people need to die,” Lawson said. “We just need to have more gun reform and legislation to protect children.”
Speakers on Wednesday demanded expedited action, noting the Democratic majority in the House was able to pass tax legislation within a few weeks of the start of the new legislative session. Democrats have a narrow 56-54 majority in the House and 20-18 majority in the Senate.
Several MSU students, including at least one survivor of the deadly November 2021 shooting at Oxford High School that killed four students and wounded seven other individuals, spoke from the stage alongside lawmakers who promised immediate action on gun regulations.
“I want you to know that it is different, and it is enough, and we will make a change,” said Rep. Julie Brixie, D-Meridian Township.
On Monday night, suspected gunman Anthony McRae opened fire in Berkey Hall and the MSU Union, allegedly killing students Alexandria Verner, Arielle Anderson and Brian Fraser. McRae later died in Lansing from a self-inflicted gun shot, police said.
MSU sophomore Cayla Stec said she barricaded herself in her dorm room during the shelter-in-place order Monday night while the gunman was at large.
“You don’t know how it feels until it happens to you,” Stec said. “When will it end? How many more? I don’t want to die for an education.”
Michigan State University students on Wednesday hold a sit-in at the state Capitol in Lansing following a deadly mass shooting Monday night at the East Lansing school, sitting in the same formation they would for lockdown drills at school. Eight MSU students were shot, three fatally, by a lone gunman who later died of a self-inflicted gun shot.
The Michigan House of Representatives went into session after the protest and honored MSU and Lansing-area police officers during a ceremony on the House floor.
In a House floor speech, state Rep. Abraham Aiyash, D-Hamtramck, apologized to MSU victims for failing them and called the shooting a “manmade tragedy.”
Andrea Jones, the parent of Oxford High School students and an aunt to an MSU student, came to the Capitol to demand change after months of asking for it in the aftermath of the Oxford shooting.
“In 13 months, some of our students have experienced two mass shootings and that’s unacceptable,” Jones said.
U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, speaking from the Capitol steps, said she was “freaking furious” to be speaking on another incident of gun violence, a little more than a year after the Oxford shooting.
“You either decide you give a crap about children and say you’ll do something to protect them, or you do not care about children,” said Slotkin, a Democrat representing the district that includes Lansing.
The Grand Rapids-based Great Lakes Gun Rights has criticized the immediate push for additional gun regulation and urged Michigan residents to demand their lawmakers “oppose all gun control efforts.”
“Handgun registration laws and ‘gun-free’ zones didn’t stop this evil madman, and they won’t stop another one in the future,” Great Lakes Gun Rights Executive Director Brenden Boudreau said in a Tuesday statement. "More gun control in Michigan will leave law-abiding citizens helpless when they need to defend themselves and others."
Senate Minority Leader Aric Nesbitt, R-Porter Township, said Tuesday his "heart breaks" for the MSU victims and families, arguing that schools need to continue to be made safer and improvements should be made to mental health screening and care.
He also has emphasized that current laws should be enforced, which appears to refer to McRae's past plea deal that reduced a felony firearms charge with potential prison time to a misdemeanor that resulted in probation and what Nesbitt called "soft-on-crime prosecutors."
"I am willing to work with anyone who wants to find solutions that will better protect our children," Nesbitt said. "But we have to be honest with one another — proposing bills that do not address the root causes of this epidemic just to do something, is just as bad as doing nothing.”
The Ingham County Prosecutor's Office's said the misdemeanor charge and the felony charge would have brought similar probation terms for McRae.
