00:00Manuel Oliver here from Washington, D.C. reporting our second day in front of the White House
00:05waiting for a meeting with President Biden.
00:08This is my fourth day, day number seven, day number eight.
00:12Manuel Oliver is the father of a school shooting victim.
00:16He has decided to spend every day outside the White House until President Biden agrees
00:21to speak with him about gun safety laws.
00:24I spoke to him on his eighth day in front of the White House.
00:27And I am right here in front of the White House.
00:30I lost my son, Joaquin, at the Portland shooting four years ago.
00:37The day that I lost my son, I lost my best friend.
00:42And that hurts.
00:44His son, Joaquin, was 17 years old when he was killed in 2018.
00:48Ever since, Manuel and his wife, Patricia, have been fighting tirelessly to prevent this
00:53from happening to others.
00:54Joaquin went to school one day, and then he never came back home.
00:59So that made my wife, Patricia, and myself start working on preventing gun violence projects
01:10just like that.
01:11And after four years, we heard that just a few days ago there was another shooting in
01:19Oxford.
01:22And then I said, you know what, if we haven't learned anything from the last four years,
01:29we need to do something in a different way.
01:31We need to try something different, like we need to change the strategy.
01:35On December 1st, one day after the deadliest school shooting of 2021, which claimed the
01:40lives of four teenagers in Michigan, Manuel boarded a flight to D.C. with a mission.
01:45Right now I'm in Fort Lauderdale International Airport on my way to D.C.
01:50I don't have a formal invitation.
01:52There is no time for that.
01:54I want an explanation why three kids died yesterday.
01:57Two years ago, Manuel had met Biden during his campaign trail to discuss Biden's plan
02:02on gun control.
02:03I asked Manuel what he would ask the president if he were to meet him again, but he was quick
02:07to correct me. It's not if he meets him.
02:10It's when.
02:11I don't want to I don't want to think that if I get the meeting, when I get the meeting
02:15with Biden, I will start by offering my
02:20support to whatever plan he has in mind.
02:25Where is that plan?
02:27What is it that you're trying to address immediately?
02:30And and besides that, asking him
02:35to declare this a national emergency and to declare war on gun
02:40violence. A week ago, when I started coming here, by
02:44meaning probably 800 victims of gun violence ago,
02:50they told me that they were decorating Christmas inside the White House.
02:55That really offended me in a way that very
02:59few things have before, because I know that I will
03:04never, ever again decorate Christmas at home.
03:09So I had no plans for this Christmas.
03:12I came here and I still don't have any plan.
03:15My plan is to wait for Biden to receive me, and hopefully that
03:20will happen sooner than later.
03:22At one point during our conversation, he had to put me on hold.
03:25He was receiving an important call, one that could maybe get him one step closer to the
03:30White House.
03:30I have to take a call right now from the Senate.
03:33So if we can connect in a minute, that will be awesome.
03:36OK, that was a call from from Senate, from a member of the Senate.
03:41And he will join me today.
03:44So that's good, because now we have more political
03:49figures understanding that this is only going to help them.
03:53He later told me that it was Senator Chris Murphy who, on the day of the recent school
03:58shooting, gave a powerful speech condemning gun violence.
04:01There's no other nation in the high income world in which kids worry about being
04:06shot when they go to school.
04:09It happens here in America because we choose to let it happen.
04:12While many bills on gun control have been drafted, Manuel is frustrated with the amount
04:17of time it is taking for these bills to become law.
04:21Meanwhile, thousands of people die to gun violence every year.
04:25At this moment, there are only bills there.
04:27They won't get into Senate and Senate won't discuss them because they don't want to do
04:32that. However, bills don't save lives.
04:36OK, laws probably save lives.
04:40The president has the ability to to put some laws together by executive orders.
04:45And that is exactly why I need to talk to the president.
04:49How is it possible that the most powerful nation in the world, that's how some
04:54people call America, is not able to fix that problem, that inside
04:59problem, a war that they are having with themselves?
05:03How is it that we cannot fix that?
05:05At the end of her call, I asked Manuel, where did he find the strength to keep fighting
05:10despite gun violence increasing?
05:12Because people like you, because you want to know the story and you want to share it
05:17because people like the congressman that just called me, because there is a lot of
05:22people out here that agrees with what I do.
05:25And that's the incentive of me being
05:31vocal and raising Joaquin's voice.
05:33I am a father.
05:34I am Joaquin's dad.
05:37And that hasn't stopped.
05:39That that didn't end on February 14th, four years ago.
05:42I'm still Joaquin's dad.
05:44So I have to do things that fathers do.
05:47So my my one and only fight is honoring
05:51the legacy of my son, Joaquin, and all the other victims.
05:56Since Joaquin was shot, more than one hundred and fifty thousand
06:01people have died because of gun violence in America.
06:04So we have done very little.
06:08We have more victims than before.
06:10We have more weapons than before.
06:12We still manufacture guns and there are still people making money on an industry
06:18that it's that it's killing our own citizens.
06:21I think there is hope, not immediate hope.
06:26But I think that things won't happen by themselves.
06:30We have to show that we are offended
06:34and we need to do things like the one that we're doing here.
Comments