INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT TO END SCHOOL GUN VIOLENCE

WHEREAS, the call to action against gun violence, led by the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., has drawn hundreds of thousands of activists to Washington, D.C., and inspired marches around the world, where demonstrators have joined together to demand an end to gun violence and call on U.S. lawmakers to enact tougher gun control laws; and

WHEREAS, unions and their members worldwide have aligned themselves with AFT members and the communities they serve:

• The United Kingdom’s National Education Union, the largest education union in Europe, mobilized its leadership and members at its national convention to support the AFT and our members in anti-gun-violence campaigns, and announced plans for its own national day of action on April 20, 2018;
• The Union of Education Norway sent a delegation of young leaders in solidarity to participate in the March for Our Lives rally in Washington, D.C., on March 24, and the union has launched an ongoing social media campaign of support;
• In its public employees magazine, Canada’s Centrale des syndicats du Québec published interviews with AFT members from several locals on their perspectives on the Parkland tragedy and the alarming prospect of arming teachers in schools; and
• More than 100 international unions have sent letters to President Trump and U.S. lawmakers—in line with the demands of the 187,000 members of the Australian Education Union—to demand a ban on assault rifles; and

WHEREAS, the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, which tracks lives lost in every country, notes that the United States has 3.85 deaths due to gun violence per 100,000 people—eight times higher than the rate in Canada and 27 times higher than Denmark; and according to The New York Times, there are more public mass shootings in America than in any other country in the world, and our per capita ownership of guns is only exceeded by war-torn Yemen; and

WHEREAS, this unique political and social moment clearly presents an opportunity for students, educators and their families to participate in activism and mobilization on a worldwide scale:

RESOLVED, that the AFT expresses its gratitude for international support received in the wake of the Parkland tragedy, and that the AFT’s members and leaders acknowledge the deeply felt emotional solidarity shown by union family members worldwide; and

RESOLVED, that the AFT will utilize other countries’ experience and evidence-based solutions as part of our union’s legislative campaigns at the local, state and national levels, to advocate for commonsense gun reform.