Marjory Stoneman Douglas student survivor Emma González delivered an amazingly powerful speech, the last of many during Saturday’s March for Our Lives protest in Washington, D.C. (Full speech above.) All the speeches were personal, inspiring, and monumental, but González’s speech was enveloping.
And then she stopped speaking. After more than a minute someone came on stage, touched her shoulder, and appeared to ask if she were OK. González didn’t move. Didn’t speak.
Protestors and rally-goers, not quite sure what was happening, started to chant, “Never again! Never again!”
Still, nothing, but a tear running down her face.
The audience grew silent.
Someone in the audience, perhaps thinking González had reached her breaking point, shouted, “We love you Emma!”
She didn’t respond.
And then, after nearly four minutes had passed, a timer went off.
González reached into her pocket and announced, “Since the time that I came out here, it has been six minutes and 20 seconds. The shooter has ceased shooting and will soon abandon his rifle, blend in with the students and walk free for an hour before arrest,” she told the crowd, explaining her silence. The shooter at Marjory Stoneman Douglas took just six minutes and 20 seconds to murder all 17 people.
“Fight for your lives before it’s someone else’s job.”
And then she walked off, having just become one of the most powerful people in America.