#TalkRadio – September 10: Turning Tragedy into Activism: the 2024 Election, Gun Violence, and Georgia Apalachee High School Shooting

SPEAKERS:

Konoba Zoe Touray: 12:00 PM – 12:57 PM ET
Transformative Justice Coalition-certified Voting Rights Advocate & Fellow, September 2023 Class; Oxford High School school shooting survivor in suburb of Detroit, Michigan. 

Jaheim McRae: 12:00 PM – 12:57 PM ET
Transformative Justice Coalition-certified Voting Rights Advocate & Fellow, April 2023 Class; Activist; Creator; Drone Photographer; U.S Army National Guard // 12B – Combat Engineer; Journalism and Mass Communication student at North Carolina A&T State University; Gun Violence Survivor; Has worked with Growing Change, BVM, and the NAACP and participated/led various marches and demonstrations. Featured on podcasts and articles, including Politico, Spectrum News, and people’s world. 

INTRODUCTION:

Hi Igniters For Change! The Igniting Change Radio Show on Tuesday, September 10th, 2024, from 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM Eastern Time, entitled “Turning Tragedy into Activism: the 2024 Election, Gun Violence, and Georgia Apalachee High School shooting”, will be live with Radio Show Co-Hosts and Transformative Justice Coalition (TJC) Co-Leaders Attorneys Barbara Arnwine, Esq. and Daryl Jones, Esq. and will feature special guests Jaheim McRae and Konoba Zoe Touray to discuss gun violence, the need for gun control and how its spurring young voter registration, and the horrific Apalachee High School shooting.

Read excerpts about the shooting below, taken from Eric Levenson’s and Celina Tebor’s September 9th, 2024 CNN article entitled “A text, a call, then gunfire: New details raise questions about efforts to prevent Georgia school shooting”. (Trigger Warning: graphic depictions of gun violence)

“I’m sorry, mom.”

Those were the words Colt Gray texted his mother Wednesday morning before the deadliest school shooting in the United States so far this year erupted at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia.

That text was enough to spur a call from Marcee Gray to her son’s school to warn about an unspecified “extreme emergency” at 9:50 a.m., according to call logs and a text exchange between Marcee Gray and her sister, who provided them to CNN. Marcee Gray spoke to a school counselor for about 10 minutes, Charles Polhamus, her father, told CNN.

“I told them it was an extreme emergency and for them to go immediately and find Colt to check on him,” Marcee Gray later said in a text message to her sister. “I don’t understand what took them so long.”

“If it weren’t for me, they would never have even known to expect anything,” she added in the texts.

The call length and the existence of the texts were first reported by The Washington Post.

Despite the call, at 10:20 a.m. police were responding to an active shooting at the school.

The text and call were two signs that foretold the chaos and violence to come, as officials say the teenager used an assault-style rifle to kill four people – two teachers and two students – before surrendering to police. Seven others were wounded and two more suffered other injuries, according to authorities. 

Another warning reached Apalachee High School that morning: An unknown caller said there would be shootings at five schools that Wednesday, and Apalachee would be first.

Around 9:45 a.m., during second period, Colt Gray stepped out of his Algebra 1 class, according to his classmate Lyela Sayarath.

…

When Gray reappeared at the classroom door, another student, Bri Jones, said she was standing in his way.

Jones’ mother had always taught her to look out the door before opening it. So, when Colt Gray came back and knocked on the door, she looked – and saw him pulling out a gun, Jones said.

The teacher was sitting at her desk and asked for the door to be opened, Jones said, not knowing the student had a gun. But Jones stopped her.

“The shooter – he looked up,” she explained. “He was looking at me, my teacher, and then somebody was in the hall. He turned his head and he just started shooting.”

…

Cristina Irimie’s 53rd birthday was August 24, but the Apalachee High School math teacher wasn’t able to celebrate her big day in class until Wednesday morning. She came to school with cake and pizza “so she could celebrate her birthday with her kids,” family friend Corneliu Caprar told CNN.

An immigrant from Romania, Irimie was ever smiling and joyful in her adopted country. She had no biological children of her own – but she had her students. And she died in the shooting protecting them.

…

Nearby, sophomore Hazel Biondi was in her geometry class working on a math paper when she heard banging outside. One of her teachers, David Phenix, opened the classroom door to see what was happening – and then was shot.

“The whole class ran to the back of the classroom and that’s when we realized that my teacher got shot, and then my other teacher tried to stop the bleeding,” Hazel told CNN. “She was grabbing rags to stop the bleeding.”

Phenix managed to shut the door before falling to the ground, Hazel said.

“And then we heard more banging and we thought (the shooter) was going to come back, so we turned off all the lights and got quiet,” she said.

They sat in the dark and waited for law enforcement to arrive, while their wounded teacher remained conscious. “He was still responding, and my other teacher kept asking him to talk, so we knew he was still alive,” she said.

Once the threat cleared, Hazel said students had difficulty exiting the classroom because Phenix was lying in front of the door. “We had to walk by his blood, and that’s a sight we did not want to see,” she said.

Phenix’s daughter said in a Facebook post on Wednesday that he was shot in the foot and hip. Yet he came out of surgery with his focus elsewhere. “After waking up, some of the first words out of his mouth were, ‘Is everyone else OK?’” Katie Phenix wrote.

Hazel Biondi’s mother, Nicole Biondi, 34, told CNN that Phenix saved lives on Wednesday. “If Mr. Phenix did not shut that door …” she said, her voice trembling. She further praised him that day in a Facebook post. “He saved my baby. He saved my world,” she wrote.

In another class, Richard Aspinwall, a math teacher and assistant football coach, heard a commotion outside his room and went to see what was going on, family friend Julie Woodson told CNN in a statement.

When he did, he was shot in the chest. His students tried in vain to help him.

“His students pulled Ricky back into the classroom and used their own shirts to try to stop the bleeding and save him,” Woodson said. “If he didn’t walk out and take the bullet … who knows what would’ve happened.”

Aspinwall, a 39-year-old father of two young girls, did not survive.

Fourteen-year-olds Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, both students at the high school, were also killed in the shooting.

…

Two days after the shooting, Colt Gray was arraigned in a Barrow County courtroom on four counts of felony murder. He declined to enter a plea to the charges against him.

…

In the aftermath of the shooting, the FBI disclosed that in May 2023 it passed along a tip about Gray possibly using the app Discord to make threats against schools. Deputies in Jackson County, where Gray lived at the time with his father, Colin Gray, went to investigate but said they couldn’t substantiate the information in the tip.

In one text, an investigator wrote that he had “made contact with Colin Gray. He does have a son Colt Gray 13yoa that attends Jefferson Middle School. He denied being on the Discord app in months and never made any mentions of threats toward a school.”

Someone responded, “Did he have an AR-15.”

“Only hunting rifles,” the investigator responded.

Colin Gray has told investigators he purchased the AR-style rifle used in the school shooting as a holiday present for his son in December 2023, two law enforcement officers previously told CNN. Colin Gray faces four counts of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second-degree murder and eight counts of cruelty to children. He also declined to enter a plea.  (Source: https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/09/us/apalachee-school-shooting-unfolded/index.html )

During the last 20 minutes of the show, our Igniting Change guests will give the media their scorecard on the new weekly segment called “Election 2024 and Race Media Report Card” and their report card on the media’s coverage of the Apalachee High School shooting. Over the years, Igniting Change has pointed out the many failures and misadventures of the U.S. media’s coverage of racial issues. This journalistic incompetence reaches a new high during political contests, especially during presidential elections. From misguided headlines which thoughtlessly give credence to racial attacks, to the lack of fact checking, and the treatment of racial slurs, tropes, and stereotypes as fair commentary, this period has reeked of abysmal journalism. We will discuss some of these matters and what is necessary to be done to make the overall media more competent. 

As both guests are TJC Fellows, they will also give their perspectives on the incoming Sept. 11th – 14th, 2024 Gen Z and Young Millennial Votes Matter Leadership Training Class.

QUESTIONS:

12:00 PM – 12:40 PM Eastern Time

• We want to thank the two of you for being on today’s show. This is a highly sensitive and triggering subject for so many, including the two of you. Please share with our audience your stories of how gun violence has affected your life.
• How have you been able to take to term this tragedy into activism?
• What would you say to our audience is the most important thing that they can do to address gun violence?
• When you heard about the Apalachee High School shooting in Georgia, what were some of your first thoughts?
• School shooting are particularly pernicious, yet politicians are content to talk about “thoughts and prayers” instead of taking meaningful action. How do we all get off this merry go round and actually take constructive action to end gun violence?
• One of the controversial issues in this shooting is that the father purchased the gun as a Christmas present. And, even in this presidential election, we’ve seen meme after meme after meme celebrating the possession of guns and the threat of gun violence in an almost bragging manner. How do we best educate on gun control?
• If you had a magic wand, what solutions would you seek in stopping gun violence?

12:40 PM – 12:56 PM Eastern Time- SEGMENT TITLE: “Election 2024 and Race Media Report Card” & the upcoming Gen Z and Young Millennial Votes Matter Leadership Training

• How would you grade the media on its reporting of the Apalachee High School shooting?
• Do you hope there will be a question about this incident, school shootings, and gun control will come up during tonight’s presidential debate?
• For the past week, what grade would you give from A – F of the media’s coverage of the racial aspects of the 2024 election?
• Why did you give this grade?
• There has been a disturbing trend of negative lies being distributed by known celebrities, influencers, and others on social media and generally in conversations. How do we combat this?
• How do people discern when something is a straight up lie?
• How do people find trusted messengers?
• How can our listeners get involved in holding the media accountable?
• Last year, you both were part of the Gen Z and Young Millennial Votes Matter Leadership Trainings. As you are aware, we are about to start a new class tomorrow.
• What has your training meant to you?
• What do you hope this training will impart to your new class members?
• What is your advice to them as they get ready to start tomorrow?
• Eldric, your fellow TJC Alumni, registered over 1,000 people on his college campus to vote last month. Vote.org reported a 700% increase in voter registration within two days of Vice President Kamala Harris being endorsed by President Biden. 83% of these new registrants were below the age of 35. The majority of new registrants have been aged 18. More recent data reveals that the majority of registrants are women and that Black women are driving the new voter registration trends. However, in the last election cycles, young voter turnout is significantly lower than their registration numbers and than any other cohort.
• What can be done about this?
• What do you think is the most important grassroots organizing that you think needs to happen in order to ensure that we’re following up with voters?
• Do you think the higher number of 18 year old registrants is due to the need for gun control?
• What are your one-minute final thoughts to our listeners?
• Thank you for all of your hard work. How do our listeners get in contact with you?

(Barbara will remind listeners to double check their voter registration as voter purging ended recently.)