Florida shooting victim’s father to Trump: ‘I’m pissed’

The father of a student killed in last week’s Florida school shooting on Wednesday told President Trump “I’m pissed” and said the Trump administration has to prevent tragedies like school shootings from happening again.

“We as a country failed our children. This shouldn’t happen,” Andrew Pollack told Trump during a listening session at the White House. 

“It stops here with this administration and me,” he said. “It should have been one school shooting and we should have fixed it. I’m pissed. Because my daughter, I’m not going to see again. She’s not here. … It’s enough. Let’s get together, work with the president and fix the schools.”

Pollack directly addressed the president, saying, “Mr. President, we’re going to fix it.”

He went on to say the country reacted quickly to the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

“I’m very angry that this happened because it keeps happening. 9/11 happened once and they fixed everything. How many schools, how many children have to get shot?” he said. “I can’t get on a plane with a bottle of water but some animal can come into a school and shoot our children.”

Pollack is the father of Meadow Pollack, who was killed last week at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., when Nikolas Cruz is accused of opening fire with an AR-15 rifle. The shooting resulted in the deaths of 17 people and more than a dozen others were injured. 

“We have to come together as a country, not different parties, and figure out how we protect the schools. It’s simple. It’s not difficult. We protect airports, we protect concerts, stadiums, embassies, the Department of Education that I walked in today that has a security guard in the elevator. How do you think that makes me feel?” Pollack continued.

Pollack was photographed wearing a “Trump 2020” campaign shirt during his initial search for his daughter last week.

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The shooting has reignited the nationwide debate on gun control. 

Students across the country staged walkouts on Wednesday to demand action on gun laws from lawmakers.

Survivors of the shooting visited Florida’s capitol in Tallahassee on Wednesday with hopes of lobbying state lawmakers to take action on gun control.

The White House listening session on Wednesday was also attended by Vice President Pence and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. 

Trump opened the session vowing to get tough on background checks.

“We’re going to be very strong on background checks,” the president said. “It’s not going to be talk like it has been in the past. It’s been going on too long. Too many instances, and were going to get it done.”

The listening session was made up of Stoneman Douglas students and parents, as well as the parents of victims from the Sandy Hook Elementary School and Columbine High School shootings.