Parkland dad fights against lowering gun purchase age back to 18

The history matters.

After intense lobbying by Parkland families, then-governor Rick Scott signed a series of bipartisan reforms into law less than a month after the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018. They included the establishment of extreme risk protection orders and the armed guardian program. The law also raised the legal age to buy a gun from 18 to 21.

Now there’s a house bill that would reverse that provision, lowering the age to buy a gun back to 18 years old.

“Our current law is working, I implore each of you to remember that law is written in the blood of the victims, including my beautiful daughter, Gina,” said Tony Montalto, testifying before a House Subcommittee in Tallahassee on Tuesday.

Montalto has become one of the most familiar faces and most recognizable voices among the Parkland victims. He was one of the founders of the non-partisan group, Stand With Parkland, and joined about a dozen people who spoke out Tuesday against HB 1223.

“I’m here today because an 18-year-old purchased a weapon and later terrorized my local high school, killing 17 and wounding 17 others,” Montalto said.

Montalto was among the Parkland victims who surrounded Scott when he signed the law.

“The raising the age to 21 was part of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act, having that bill in place has helped save lives, it has helped prevent another school shooting tragedy,” Montalto said.

Stand With Parkland supports school safety and gun safety policies, and Montalto says the organization supports the Second Amendment but within “guardrails.”

“At Stand With Parkland, we don’t believe we should roll back any protections that were put in place, we’ve seen Florida get it right, we’ve seen Florida lead the nation in what we’ve done after the Parkland tragedy,” he said. “We have no further to look than Texas, which has had two school shootings after Parkland, because they did not do what Florida did, they didn’t make the hard choices, they didn’t come together to help solve the problems.”

One supporter of lowering the gun purchase age said if an 18-year-old can serve in the military, that person should be able to legally buy a firearm.

Several opponents of the bill said many 18-year-olds don’t have the emotional maturity to handle the responsibility of gun ownership. As an example, Montalto mentioned the 18-year-old who brought a loaded gun to Stranahan High School last week.

Earlier in the day, Montalto was in a different hearing room, speaking in favor of a school safety bill.

“The time we think we’re safe, that’s when we’re vulnerable,” testified Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri.

Gualtieri is the chair of the MSD High School Public Safety Commission. Montalto joined him in supporting the school safety bill, saying it builds on progress made in that field since 2018. It mandates locked classroom doors and provides conflict de-escalation training to armed guardians.

“One really important piece of this bill is promoting the use of tip reporting, this is vital to expanding the eyes and ears of law enforcement and school administration so that our students and teachers are safe,” Montalto said.