Cam Kaskey (2:32)

Well, yeah, that's on you, dude.

Rob Shentrup (2:33)

I mean, Little Caesars, it reminded me of childhood. I remember there was a blockbuster and a Little Caesars right by my house. I was driving By. And I was like, I haven't had this in a long time. I should see how it's doing. But the thing that honestly got me the most was for one cheese pizza, breadsticks, and a soda. It was $20, which I. That's Trump's economy right there. That was ridiculous.

Tim Miller (2:58)

That's high. I feel like, super high.

Rob Shentrup (3:00)

I remember it was like $5 even, like a couple years ago when I was in college.

Tim Miller (3:04)

You have to pay me 20 bucks to fucking put that shit in my belly.

Cam Kaskey (3:08)

Yeah. I mean, that was the only appeal of Little Caesars. There's one in. I don't. I don't know if it's Parkland or our sister town, Coral Springs, but there's one right by the publix. And you would go there when you were like, a broke high school student and you got less hours at your high school job that week, so you didn't have as much money.

Tim Miller (3:25)

This was a sign I was even back. Oh, sorry, you're gonna have to beep that or we're gonna get demonetized all the way back to high school. Because I wouldn't even do it then. It was too gross for me. I was too dainty. I was like, I will starve. I'll just eat goldfish. I'll just eat goldfish for dinner over each little season.

Cam Kaskey (3:41)

What's your favorite, like, low brow pizza place, Tim?

Tim Miller (3:44)

I don't. I don't have one. I'm not a low brow pizza person. Who wants low brow pizza? What's your.

Rob Shentrup (3:49)

I think.

Tim Miller (3:49)

I think I guess Domino's. If I had to pick, I guess thin crust Domino's is the least offensive.

Cam Kaskey (3:54)

Yeah, Domino's is pretty great. But anyway, so Robert, I want to get into your story because you have very similar political origin to me, because we both date back to the same mass shooting that happened, like, one mile away from where I'm sitting right now.

Rob Shentrup (4:11)

Yeah.

Cam Kaskey (4:12)

And while I, after this terrible tragedy, went on TV and put makeup on a bunch, you decided to do actual political organizing. So if you could just take us on the first date, get to know you monologue. We would love for our audience to know just who they're talking to.

Rob Shentrup (4:28)

Totally. Yeah. Well, the camera. Just like you said, I got my start in the political sphere because of Parkland. Lived in South Florida my whole life, but moved to Parkland to go to high school. And that's, of course, where Cameron and I got to meet each other for the first time. And actually, tech theater, lovely class. But I first got involved, really, because of Parkland. And because of my personal connection, my sister Carmen Shentrup was one of the 17 victims of the Parkland shooting. And so my family and I were really thrust into this movement because of the loss of my sister. And for me, as I was just figuring out how to pick up the pieces in the couple months, in the couple weeks after the shooting, one of the big questions that I had and that so many people that we grew up with had, was, how did this happen? And why was this allowed to happen? And that really kind of led me to better understand. Well, I don't know. I wasn't really politically involved in high school. I worked at Taco Bell, and I, you know, I was living my little high school life. And so I just. Politics was something that was always around. My grandparents had CNN on that kind of stuff, but it wasn't something I knew a lot about. And I just kind of assumed that we had, I don't know, gun laws in this country. And the truth is that we. We don't. And I just kind of had this assumption, well, you know, I had to get a license and do all this stuff to get a license to drive a car. I feel like you probably have to do something similar to buy a gun. Not true at all. And it was really just shocking to me to find out, oh, well, we just have a very low level of regulation around firearms, and actually uniquely low in comparison to every other country. And that is really why we have the problem of gun violence. And so just that those couple of weeks, just trying to understand what happened to my family and just the ways that. I mean, so many failures happened. Right. Not only, of course, with our gun laws, but, I mean, we got a call a couple of days after the shooting from the FBI. Hey, we got a tip about this guy. So our tip line, and we just never followed up on it. And, like, we're sorry.

Cam Kaskey (6:48)

There were, like, 40 tips about the shooter from our high school. Right. Like, there were literally dozens of reports filed with the police about.

Rob Shentrup (6:55)

With the police? Yeah. With the local police. Yep. No, 100%, like, they knew this guy was bad news.

Cam Kaskey (7:00)

We also had a cop on campus, school resource officer, a guy named Scott Peterson, who. One of the first things the Republicans said after the shooting was, this is why we need more cops in schools.

Rob Shentrup (7:12)

Yeah.

Cam Kaskey (7:13)

Well, then it comes to light that the cop, the armed officer that we did have at school, ran away from the shooting when he heard that there was somebody with a gun literally hidden across. He hid in the closet.

Rob Shentrup (7:25)

Yeah. There's, like, A video.

Cam Kaskey (7:27)

He ought to talk to the first, like, two decades of Tim Miller's life.

Tim Miller (7:30)

If you don't mind. Cameron, before you get in deep into the. Into the gun talk, Rob, could you, like, tell us about your sister?

Rob Shentrup (7:38)

Yeah, absolutely. So Carmen and I were born 18 months apart, so very much grew up together, and we were very different people. And Carmen in high school, it was her senior year. I mean, she was months away from graduating high school, and she was someone much more committed to the scholastic element than I was. She took a lot of AP classes. She was someone who. I mean, she wanted to be a medical researcher. We had a number of people in our lives who died from als. And so she was really interested in going to school and researching the disease, trying to understand why ALS happens and what we can do to cure it. And so she wanted to get good grades in school, to go to a good college, to get into a good research program, to be able to do this right, to commit her life to public service, in a way. And that was really Carmen's dream. Um, and so that. And that was very different from me, who at that time, 2018, I was in my freshman year of college, did not know what I wanted to do. Kind of just went to college because it was the thing that I thought was the next step.

Tim Miller (8:48)

I'm assume Florida. Assuming. Went to Gainesville.

Rob Shentrup (8:50)

Yeah, well, I went to the University of Central Florida. Didn't get into us, got denied from that one. But both my parents did go to the University of Florida. So that was tough when I didn't get in, but Carmen did. And we actually got her acceptance letter, I mean, literally a week after she was killed. And so it was something where, while we were pretty different people, there was one thing that. Well, there were a couple of things that really kept us close even when she was in high school and I was in high school going to college. And that really was, well, comic books. Big fan of the Marvel universe, not so much the DC she we loved and watched together the Sherlock Holmes series with Benedict Cumberbatch on BBC. And so pop culture was definitely kind of connection that we got to have as our lives started to look a little bit different. But, I mean, Carmen was an incredible sister and, I mean, a sibling and a partner in, you know, me growing up. And so, you know, we're almost. I mean, seven and a half, almost eight years after Parkland now. I mean, I was talking to through my job. I work with a lot of students, high school and college. And one of my students was like, oh, yeah, Parkland happened when I was in second grade.

Cam Kaskey (10:06)

Jesus Christ.

Rob Shentrup (10:08)

It's, it's also, it's going to be out of the memory of a lot of students that are coming into high school now. So, you know, it's. It's hard kind of eight years from now. I mean, there's the, the memories that you have. I mean, just as part of survivorship, they narrow. And part of kind of the truism of time heals all wounds is also you just forget how much it hurts sometimes.

Tim Miller (10:32)

Do you try to combat that, like, fight it, like, do things to try to broaden the memories?

Rob Shentrup (10:38)

Totally. So on Carmen's birthday, I always try to, to take time to, you know, just go back through the photos that we have together of us. We have a memorial page for her. And so it's good to just have the chance to look back at and try and like, remember those moments. And, you know, there's also mementos that we have of hers that are, are really important. And I mean, even today, the car that she drove is now the car that I drive. And so still, yeah, that 2009 Toyota Prius is kicking. It might be on its last leg.

Cam Kaskey (11:21)

But you're such a Prius guy.

Rob Shentrup (11:23)

I look, when that thing dies, I'm buying another one. And this is not, this is not sponsored at all. It's just a really good car for me. Not yet, but I mean, I have Carmen sunglasses in the sunglass holder where she left them. And so for me, that's like a part of that connection. I mean, still with her.

Cam Kaskey (11:39)

My quintessential Carmen centrup memory was that. So Robert was in tech theater. And the difference between being in tech and on stage when you're a theater kid, if any theater kids are listening to this, it's two different genres of human being. And the tech theater kids are sort of the alt leftist punk rock kids. And the onstage kids mostly become political commentators and start the Daily Wire. But Carmen was in Shrek the Musical with me when I was a freshman, and I played the role of Peter Pan because I was more twinkish than you could ever imagine somebody being. As a freshman. I made my current self look like a butch twunk. Carmen was one of the three Little Pigs because the fairy tale creatures were getting pogrommed out of the sort of Disney America city called Dulac by Lord Farquaad, who was played by John Lithgow in the movie. But that is one of the differences between Robert and Carmen that he didn't mention. Was Robert Was in the hardcore blue haired nose ring, sort of Bernie Sanders tech kids who would lift up the equipment and operate the lights and everything, Whereas Carmen and I were sort of sucking up all of the glory and and prestige of being stage performers.

Tim Miller (13:05)

Which pig was she? Are there different pigs or are they all the same? It's like an Alvin shyman Theodore thing. Or is it like they take one?

Rob Shentrup (13:13)

I honestly don't remember there.

Cam Kaskey (13:15)

No, they were just the three pigs. And I think stripping them of their individuality was very up. It almost brings to mind animal farm, which everybody ought to read by George Orwell. It's very educational. So, Robert, you know, there were sort of two directions that activists who were responding to the parkland shooting went. There was the glitzy glamour cam and his march for our lives. Friends, we are going on the Ellen degeneres show and putting on a show for everybody. And then there were the people.

Tim Miller (13:46)

Was Ellen mean? People say Ellen was mean behind the scenes. And I always. I always resent that. I don't like that image of her.

Cam Kaskey (13:54)

Ellen's eyes were so icy. She just sort of looked at us and passed us by. And I don't. She wasn't aggressive. She wasn't negging us or throwing staplers at our head or what was it that Amy klobuchar threw at one of her comb? She wasn't Klobu comb throwing, but she. There was a coldness about her that was alarming. Even at that time when the reports about Ellen's behavior hadn't come out. I was just so used to this affable and exciting and jovial Ellen who would do the dances and everything. So seeing her backstage, I figured she must have just been in an odd place that day. And that's totally fine. And I think having people who are tied to such a tragedy on her show might have been a little different for her. And it took her out of a certain zone that she got in. But then the reports came out about how Ellen acted and I was like, yep, that was sort of the Ellen that I knew. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure the ice cold, frosty Ellen that I interacted with was the nice side of her, Because I don't think she's come in just to be mean to the parkland kids. But Ellen is another thing that today's kids don't remember. I mean, it used to be if something went viral online, there was a going viral online to being on the Ellen DeGeneres show three days later. Pipeline.

Tim Miller (15:18)

Yeah, the little kid, the Cowboy hat, singing, doing the yodeling.

Cam Kaskey (15:21)

I met that kid.

Tim Miller (15:22)

You met the yodeling kid?

Cam Kaskey (15:24)

I met the yodeling kid. I had no idea who he was.

Tim Miller (15:26)

I saw him recently. He's a full. He's a twunk now. I saw. He's. He's making a comeback.

Rob Shentrup (15:31)

Oh, God.

Cam Kaskey (15:32)

When.

Tim Miller (15:32)

I mean, I know he might be heterosexual. I just mean, like, he's like a grown. You know, time flies. The linear nature of time is challenging. He's grown up.

Cam Kaskey (15:41)

When I was 17, I was looking at him like he was this adorable little boy. But no, I met him at some sort of event. I think it might have been We Day, which is a huge fucking production for something that nobody ever talks about. I was presented an award by Jennifer Aniston. And there's a picture of me, Amanda Gorman, the phenomenal poet who's never given a bad poem and has only done perfect things. Morgan Freeman. And there was somebody else. I know Shawn Mendes was there. It was. We Day has these giant fucking events that are jam packed with celebrities. And you'd think it would be this thing that everybody talks about, but I've only ever heard about it three times, and it was the three times that I was involved. I met AOC backstage at a We Day event. But anyway, it's sort of like a global.

Tim Miller (16:29)

We should do a reenactment of all the awards you've received on one FYpod. You've got every episode there's a new award I learn about.

Cam Kaskey (16:37)

We're not allowed to run longer than an hour. So I don't think we'd be able to fit all of my prestige into that. But to the original point that I was making, I was this television almost Trumpian. It's all about what I'm saying, how I'm saying it, and how much I can get the media to respond to it. Like similar activists from Parkland who we don't need to talk about. But there was also some real activism happening. And you had March for Our Lives, which was very much about building hype and energy for the gun control movement, something that we did for several months extraordinarily well. But then you had organizations like Brady, Everytown and comparable ones that were more focused on doing research and studies and providing the information that we, when we would go out and speak, would actually be citing. Right. When we went to go address different communities and we went all over the country to do so, we would be using research from other gun control organizations. And there was just a big difference between what we were doing, which was very much a performance in order to draw attention to the issue. And then stuff like Brady and Everytown, which were much more focused on the grassroots organizing and getting people involved to do the work. That March for Our Lives was kind of trying to uplift but not really doing ourselves. I'm interested in hearing what it was, how you got involved with Brady and then what the path has been for you since.

Rob Shentrup (18:04)

Yeah, well, I got involved with Brady. I mean, a couple months after the shooting, I was working at UCF's campus with a number of other folks who were activated by the shooting and just said, I want to do something. I mean, the University of Central Florida had one of the largest alumni populations of Marjory Stoneman Douglas of any college. There were, like, 500 people that at some point had graduated our high school that were at UCF in 2018. And so there were a ton of people that were like, we need to do something, and we need to organize on campus. I mean, it also had to do with the fact that, I mean, Pulse was a couple miles from campus. Right.

Tim Miller (18:42)

And I was gonna say. I'm trying to. Look. It all blurs, but I'm trying to remember.

Cam Kaskey (18:46)

So Pulse was before Parkland 2016, I believe.

Tim Miller (18:50)

Got it. So you're only, what, two years out of. Out of Pulse there, and you're in Orlando. Yeah, yeah.

Rob Shentrup (18:55)

And I mean, Pulse is back in the news because we saw DeSantis painted over the rainbow crosswalk right outside the memorial, which is honestly fucked up.

Tim Miller (19:05)

Well, it's important that we don't erase any memorials of Confederate soldiers. Every single Confederate bust must stand. But. But gay memorials to shootings at gay clubs, those can be erased. That's not a big deal. We're not. We don't need to honor all history, just Confederate. It's just critical that Confederate history be acknowledged at every opportunity.

Cam Kaskey (19:28)

What if we get some undeniable historical document proving that Robert E. Lee was actually a flaming. I'm not. I don't want to get us demonetized. Let's say homosexual individual.

Tim Miller (19:38)

Yeah.

Cam Kaskey (19:39)

Do you think they'll tear down half the statue or.

Tim Miller (19:43)

It's a good question. I don't know. If it was painted with a rainbow, they'd probably put.

Cam Kaskey (19:48)

Replace it with an Andrew Jackson. I don't know.

Tim Miller (19:50)

So you're at. This is my fault. I started gagging. So you're at UCF Pulse. It happened in Orlando. There's a lot of big Marjorie Stone, Doug, Ms. Douglas alumni contingent.

Rob Shentrup (20:00)

Yeah.

Tim Miller (20:01)

You know, how did the organizing them start?

Rob Shentrup (20:04)

It really just got started by us saying, like, we need to do something here on campus. Both to, like, bring together everyone who had. I mean, we had just experienced, I mean, this horrible event happening. We all knew someone, me very personally, but we all knew someone that day that was either shot and injured. I mean, 17 people were and. Or shot and killed. And so I got involved with kind of that organizing on campus, and we started to build kind of community events, but also really just starting to build organizing on campus to say, right, what can we do to push for the laws in Florida to change? And so with my family and then with the group at school, I had the chance to go to Tallahassee and really lobby and talk to elected officials about read the need to change something. And already at that time, Cameron, exactly like you're saying, I mean, we found out days afterwards that the police knew for the longest time that the shooter was someone that was unstable, that he had access to guns. And there were law enforcement that came out in the aftermath and said, we wish we had something that we could do to remove weapons from the situation, even just temporarily, because this kid had a whole litany of issues that needed to be addressed. And so the advocacy in Florida was really how I got connected to Brady, because, Cameron, exactly like you're saying, Giffords and Brady and Everytown, a lot of great research as to just, like, what does the issue of gun violence look like? And of course, what are some ideas about things that we can do? And so it's kind of through the kind of pushing for the Marjory Stoneman Douglas School Safety act that I got connected with Brady, and that law is still on the books in Florida. We're one of the few Republican states that have things like extremist protection orders still on the books.

Tim Miller (21:59)

It is crazy about, like, the difference between then and now. And obviously your work and goes into that, and you all get a lot of credit. And also. But also the time, like, the ways in which the political winds have changed and made the Republican Party just. Yeah, not that it wasn't extreme in 2017. It was. And Trump was already president, but, like, there are levels to this. And it's become much more challenging to get anything like this. Any movement, like, totally. Like, you tell people, like, you know, somebody had just got into politics, maybe in 2020 or something, and you're like. And like, aft in 2018, what year was it? 17, 18, 19. I was like, Rick Scott, a Republican governor of Florida. It wasn't a Rick Scott. I'm going from memory it was Rick Scott that signed the bill to put red flag laws in, in Florida. And that's like unimaginable now. It's like hard to imagine Democratic states. Jedi in Colorado did it recently because Jared Polis is awesome. But like, I don't imagine you, some Democratic governors would be, would be worried about the backlash. Like what do you attribute that change to?

Rob Shentrup (23:06)

Yeah, I mean, after kind of, you know, helping advocate with so many other people to get that law put in place in Florida, I kind of took the that experience and of course my story and was able to go to a variety of other states and advocate for them to pass some of their laws. And I saw in real time in the, in late 2018 and in the 2019 legislative session the polarization right around this policy idea. But honestly, just around the issue where I had like promising conversations with Republican members of state legislatures, I'm even thinking specifically of Michigan. There were like three people who were Republican elected who were like, you know what, this makes a lot of sense. I see why you guys did it in Florida. Let's try to bring it to Michigan. And I watched those conversations turn less and less enthusiastic and then just stop happening at all. Right. And the reason why is the gun lobby, right? The nra, but also the nssf, which really flies under the radar, but is really the one doing a lot of.

Tim Miller (24:11)

The national sports shooting.

Rob Shentrup (24:16)

Yes, Shooting Sports foundation, which is the trade lobby of the gun industry. But I mean, they're pushing all the same policies as the nra and I mean, they have hundreds of millions of dollars just like the NRA does too. Right. And they used that influence and that money and the fact that they could buy lobbyists in every state to basically make this bill like a poison pill and just kill the idea of it passing.

Cam Kaskey (24:43)

Which is how you realize that a lot of these moderate Republicans who act as though there's something they want to do about guns are not second amendment rights people who are trying to defend the rights guaranteed in the Constitution. They're just NRA shills. Because if you were pro gun and wanted to support the hunters or whatever your narrative is going to be, you would. Especially since Republicans are so hard on crime and being the anti crime party, you'd think that red flag laws would be the thing that they would rally behind immediately after something like a shooting. Especially like the one at our high school where this was a gun that was legally purchased. It was 19 year old. Walking into Dick's Sporting Goods and purchasing this weapon after so many police reports had been Filed. This guy is almost the poster boy for why something like red flag laws need to exist, why people who have been in domestic violence cases, why people who have been. Why police reports about domestic violence need to lead to the aggressors not being able to purchase firearms because so many domestic murders are committed with firearms. And so, like, you'd think that this would be exactly what Republicans are excited about, but.

Rob Shentrup (25:54)

And there's a lot of due process built into it, too. Like, there's a whole legal and, like, process for it. Yeah. For the red flag laws. And I mean, there's even a. The fact that it's temporary. Right. Even if this happens, it's only six months, and then it has to be renewed after that for like another period. Because it's really about just like intervening in that time of crisis to be able to just remove a firearm from that situation.

Tim Miller (26:18)

Cool down. Period.

Rob Shentrup (26:19)

Yeah.

Cam Kaskey (26:19)

Including people who have expressed dangerous intent towards themselves, including when somebody is. So many gun deaths are suicides.

Rob Shentrup (26:28)

Oh, my God. 60.

Tim Miller (26:30)

Yeah, Cameron, I just want to, like, add on to something you're saying, though, about how they don't, like, actually care about Second Amendment rights and our NRA shells. Like, in some ways, I feel like that's almost nice to them, the two nights, because it's just like they're just total cowards. Like, some of them are not actually shills for the nra. They become effectively shills for the NRA because they don't do anything that the NRA doesn't want, but they're just too afraid to actually stand up to them in anything, on anything. And like, I just think, like, I'm listening to your story. I'm like, getting myself madder and madder thinking about Rob. It's like you have the Uvalde shooting that happens, you know, a couple years later, after years, which is. I mean, now you want to rank out the horribleness of all these fucking shootings, but I can just like, unimaginably horrible, right? Like, it's the little kids, you know, getting fucking massacred in a school in a red state, same situation. It's like an under. A young teen. I don't have it on top of my head. I think he was 17. That's a teenager, got the firearm legally. And it's like, who is for.

Cam Kaskey (27:32)

By the way, this is an even more egregious case of police not doing their jobs. Not only do you have Scott Peterson, who ran away from the shooting, and then, by the way, the state of Florida said it was not his constitutional Responsibility to protect the students. So he got off, no pun intended. Intended. Scot free.

Rob Shentrup (27:46)

Yeah.

Cam Kaskey (27:47)

In Uvaldi, the police barricaded everybody into the shooting.

Tim Miller (27:51)

Yeah, I know. And so this kid. I, I just. My point is though, when you go to the advocacy and Rob, I'm curious to hear your take on this is just like it wasn't a perfect solution that you guys got to in Florida after. It wasn't going to save everybody's lives. But it was like a totally reasonable law that did not infringe on any law abiding non crazy person of ages rights. The red flag laws. And this thing happens in Texas and they do fucking nothing. They're just like kids can just get massacred in our school by somebody that obtained a gun legally. And like we're not going to change the laws at all. We're not going to like make you have to be 25 to like you are going to rent a car to get a fucking machine gun. We're not going to do red flag laws. Right. Like we're just going to do nothing. We're just going to have more locks on the doors. Like that was going to be like that was their biggest solution. I don't even know if they did it. Did they end up doing the locks? Like so when you guys were advocating down there, like just talk about the difference between post Parkland and post Uvalde and like the response you were getting.

Rob Shentrup (28:55)

Well, I mean that response was really, there was just a lot less polarization right around the issue in certain areas.

Cam Kaskey (29:04)

Right.

Rob Shentrup (29:04)

Like the, there were certain policies where they had a decades long history and it gave the gun lobby decades of time to lobby against it and basically make an idea that no one wanted to do. But there were some ideas that were still kind of new and gaining momentum at the time and you know, extremist protection orders, the red flag laws, like that was one of them. But we've just seen how the NRA has continued to push really what we call Brady, the big lie, which is that guns make us safer. Right. If guns made us safer, we have more guns than any other country on earth. And so we should be the safest and we're one of the least safe. And it's because our, our communities are oversaturated with firearms. I mean there's 120 guns for every 100 people. And so it leads to little kids gaining access, not knowing what it is and shooting and killing themselves. That happens eight times a day. We see how we have suicides, I mean at an extraordinary rate Especially among young people, we've seen a massive jump in firearm suicides because there's guns everywhere, unlocked and loaded. And it leads to. Also in situations where someone is either planning to do something horrible or just in the heat of the moment wants to hurt someone else, is able to get a gun and act on that. And so what we have now, I mean, is a time where the NRA has been pushing this idea that the Second Amendment, and it's really the gun lobby as a whole, is that the Second Amendment means you get to own any gun you want at any time, and any restriction is unconstitutional. And that's their frame. Right. So if we put any law on the books, even erpo, which again in Florida happened seven years ago, Right. That is now considered by many people as just, oh, well, that's unconstitutional. We can't do that. And in Florida, Tim, is actually a great point. They've been trying to get rid of that law for the last three years. They've been trying to roll back the Marjorie Summer Douglas School Safety Act.

Tim Miller (31:04)

Yeah, I went to a fucking event with Matt Gaetz and Kyle Rittenhouse at a gun show, at a gun fucking shop somewhere in the Panhandle on a reporting trip. That's what it was all about. They, like, wanted. They were going to roll that back and put in place constitutional carry. I think they did do that. I think constitute.

Rob Shentrup (31:24)

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, which just basically means you get to concealed carry gun anywhere you want and you have to have no training, which is super dangerous.

Cam Kaskey (31:32)

We're talking about the differences after Parkland and Uvalde in the way you advocate for something like gun control. But another thing I'm really interested in is what it's been like in the organizing space since November 2024, because under the Biden presidency, there were some small victories for the gun violence prevention community. There was the Office of Gun Violence Prevention, which was open for like a year and three months, I'm pretty sure. And then otherwise, I'm not entirely sure what we got. But you and I have talked privately a lot about the giant paradigm shift once Trump won in November, and how across all of the activism, organizing space, there was a massive shift in a very negative direction, but especially in the gun world. And this is kind of what I want to talk to in this next end of the conversation. I feel like the Democratic Party has largely left this issue behind. And the Democratic Party does not see this as a winning issue. As a matter of fact, they see it as almost a death sentence. And it's really interesting, because in the 2020 Democratic primary, you had two candidates, Swalwell and O', Rourke, who were literally running on gun control. Swalwell and O' Rourke's primary issue that they were running on in 2020 was gun control. And now I don't even remember if I heard the Harris campaign say a single thing about it. I'm sure they did in one way or another. But November was a sign to a lot of the activism and organizing community that things are going to be very bleak over the next four years, not only for the country, but also for their operational capacity.

Rob Shentrup (33:09)

Where.

Cam Kaskey (33:10)

Where do you stand right now as somebody who's advocating for gun safety, considering the current environment?

Rob Shentrup (33:15)

Yeah. I mean, one of the biggest things that we've had to do is just re strategize to focusing on what we can do at the local level and doing that in as many parts of the country as we can. Because, Cameron, you're right. I mean, with every movement, you have hills and you have valleys. Right. And so we saw a paradigm shift after Parkland. We really did, you know, the. The almost half decade of organizing that happened after Sandy Hook and happened after Pulse and happened after Las Vegas. Right. The way that the movement was built, allowing Parkland to be that paradigm shift moment, we saw a lot change. But 20 is really when it started to go back down again. And what we're trying to do now is how can we be able to build and secure wins at the local level and really help build momentum for that paradigm shift to happen again. Right. Create the conditions that are needed for it. And one of the things that we've really been focusing on, and something that animates me a lot is I think the issue of guns is one where you can actually change whether or not someone is going to have gun violence come into their life through a conversation. Right. If you can talk to a gun owner and help them understand the real risk of having their gun loaded and just, like, in the nightstand. Right. That is. And just help them understand how dangerous that is. Both for, like, if you have a child. Right. Them getting access, but also just even if you live alone. Right. And I mean, God forbid you live with someone else, they come home early from a shift, late at night, and you think they're an intruder. Right. Like, if you have that gun loaded and unlocked, it can lead to a lot of dangerous situations, including if you just, like, get laid off from work and you're in a bad place and you're thinking about using that gun against yourself. And so having that gun securely locked and separate from the ammunition is huge in terms of making sure that that gun is only used when you want to use it and it's not going to hurt someone else or even you in a time of crisis. And if you can have that conversation with someone and help them change their behavior, the chance that gun violence enter their life markedly decreases. And there's a lot that we can do around ERPA and Red Flag laws, just helping people know they exist. One of the biggest issues has been they exist in 21 states and in D.C. and a lot of people don't know about them. I live out here in Washington state now where we have a herbo law and we do a lot of education around it. But even then, I'm talking to my friends in the group chat, right? Like, I was just kind of interested. I was like, hey, you guys like heard about this law? And one of them was like, oh yeah, I do a lot of stuff with like people with mental health. So like, I know about it, but everyone else was like, what is this? Right? And so. And it's a law that really people have to know about it in order for it to be as effective as it should be. And so at Brady, we're working on figuring out ways to do PSAs, kind of YouTube pre roll ads, being able to do things on the air, but then also just on the ground and talking to other organizations that we're partners with about what is this law, why does it matter? And of course, how can you use it? And really focusing on those conversations with gun owners, especially new gun owners, and help people understand what are the laws that exist that I can keep, take advantage of to keep myself safe are really the ways that we've shifted our organizing. But it's also really just helping folks on an educated people about the big lie of the gun industry and really who's behind it. Right? Like the gun laws that we have right now didn't come out of nowhere. They were created by the gun lobby, which includes all of the gun manufacturers, right? The Glock, Beretta, H and K. All of these gun manufacturers give millions of dollars a year to the nra. And we know this because they're all part of the nra. Golden jacket of freedom, which is for anyone who gives over a million dollars a year.

Tim Miller (37:10)

Well, how can you turn down a golden jacket of freedom?

Cam Kaskey (37:12)

Golden jacket of freedom sounds great. You should make a Brady campaign. Purple jacket of freedom.

Tim Miller (37:18)

Purple check of Love the. I have a question for you. I mean, this is gonna sound it's gonna sound bleak. This is kind of what people come, come to me for, though. I appreciate your, like, resilience and commitment and all this. And I, like, I hear you. Like, I'm, I think it's important to do stuff at the micro, you know, because, like, that's what you can control. I say that to you about all the time, about the broader political environment, like, what can I do with Trump? And I'm like, stop thinking about it. Like, focus. What can you do in your neighborhood? Or, like, start working on things you control and the bigger problems we'll deal with eventually. But I kind of, this gun issue, man, I'm like, I'm just sitting here thinking, you guys hearing you talk, and it's like, you know, there are peaks and valleys in any movement. And that's true, but I just, I, the path out of this valley is so hard to foresee. You know, your head goes to a place that's like, yeah, I don't know, what do we need another fucking classroom of third graders to be massacred for this to change? Because that didn't do it last time, right? I, I, I just, I feel like, I don't know, like, like your mind immediately goes to, like, you have. Well, well, may, you know, will a horrible tragedy be an impetus? But, like, we've had so many horrible tragedies that were not an impetus. And so, I don't know, like, how, I'm sure you guys talk about this and think about this, like, like, how do you, yeah. Persist.

Rob Shentrup (38:39)

I mean, I, I used to be of this idea that, well, you know, I, as soon as it happens to these elected officials, right, they're going to change their mind. And we saw that happen with the Congressional baseball shooting, right? Steve Scalise, one of the ranking members of the Republican Party, he was shot, like, during the shooting. And he didn't become an activist for gun violence prevention. He doubled down.

Tim Miller (39:03)

Trump was shot. Yeah, Trump was shot, like, like a fucking kid that was able to go buy a bunch of ammo at. I always get said the wrong store. People get mad at me. I don't know, like a Lowe's or some shit, whatever. He's able to buy ammo that day. Yeah, like some kid and they get up on the roof and shoot the fucking president. And the reaction to that was not like, well, maybe we shouldn't make it so easy for crazy people to get bullets. Like, the reaction was like, who is he working for? Like, they immediately go to like, that sort of shit, like, who is, who's but was it Mossad? You know, was it. Was it the Deep state? Was it the CIA? It's like, no, it's a fucking. We have a million guns in the country and a bunch of crazy people, and that's a bad combo.

Rob Shentrup (39:47)

Yeah, well, and we have a, you know, a online community where people want to gain clout, right? And want to be able to gain notoriety through these kinds of acts, right? We've had so many at this point, it's become its own thing. And so, no, I mean, Tim, you're totally right. Like, it really is so easy for it to feel bleak. But I mean, one of the things that I think about is the problem of gun violence has been created in this way over the last 50 years. And if things can get this bad and things can change this much, it can also do that in the universe in opposite direction. And if we build the power at starting at the community level, that then can come together at the state level and then come together nationally, we can turn the tide on this. But it is something that's going to take time and energy and investment to do. It's something that is not going to be quick, even in, like the next four years kind of quick. And it is something that is, I mean, gonna take a lot of time and energy to have happen. But it's something that we know is possible, right? If things can get this badly, then things can change in the opposite direction because that level of change is possible. And so for me, I mean, the thing that I think of is the fact that, right, it's how can we change this cultural idea around guns, right? Because if you ask people today, right, you feel unsafe. What should you do? One of the first answers you're going to get is, oh, I'm going to go buy a gun, right? But buying a gun means that you're much more likely to be in danger, right? And so if we can continue to change this idea and this cultural connection around guns, helping people understand the real danger that they present and have, then we will be able to create a environment where that change is actually possible, right? Where there's not only that public support, but there's also people trying to hold the gun industry accountable for that to actually happen and for them to change their policies. Because right now there's even simple things that they could do, like putting biometric security on the guns, and they just refuse to do it.

Cam Kaskey (41:58)

One of the primary things about the big gun lie that I've been thinking about in the past couple days, the lie that guns are going to make us safer. And the quintessential heart of the gun control culture, excuse me, of the pro gun cultural movement, is the fact that this idea that we are going to stand up to a tyrannical government using these firearms, and we now see the government becoming the very tyrannical government that these people were saying was going to happen when they were trying to stoke fear about this and get people even hornier for their guns. But no good guys with guns are stepping up to protect the citizens in Washington D.C. who are getting shaken down by the fucking soldiers. Nobody was defending the people of these other cities where ICE was committing these illegal raids and everything. So as the government gets more tyrannical, the same people who are claiming to be the freedom fighters that were going to step up against them are just getting more excited and they're getting bigger hard ons because this is what they wanted all along. It was never about stopping tyranny. It was about this idea that they would have any sort of agency in the face of it if it was tyranny that they didn't actually like. But before we get to Boomer Mailbag and the fun stuff we like to do at the end of the episode, big question for you. Where do you think a 2028 Democratic nominee should be on guns? Do you think a nominee could be successful in the next election who's going harsh on guns? Or do you think they're going to need to have a bit more temperate stance?

Rob Shentrup (43:33)

I think they have to have a new frame around guns, right? Because some of the policy ideas that we talk about are so fucking old, right? We talk about background checks, we talk about assault. And these ideas have existed since the 80s and the 90s. I mean, and so they have a lot of baggage attached to them, right? They have been baked and formed in the minds of many people since they first got involved in politics. And so we have to have new ideas as we start to better understand this issue and the things that we need to do. And we have to also frame it around what are the things that are going to actually create public safety? And I mean, have we seen this in the historic drop in murder that's happened here in the last five years? Right. We've seen some of the lowest murder rates here. I mean, even just passed in 2024, in the last 10 years. 20 years. Because we've invested in community violence prevention programs, which are people just who are out in the community every day building connections and learning about, you know, are there beefs that are starting to kind of spiral out of control that they should be intervening in. Are there people who have been shot and out of hospital who they can talk to to prevent retaliatory gun violence from happening? And what we saw through the Office of Gun Violence Prevention was them actually giving these groups for the first time millions of dollars to do this incredibly important work. And we've seen the results. I mean, not only here in Seattle, but across the country. Right. The data we've been looking at in D.C. about the decline in murder rates, I mean, it's the Office of Gun violence prevention in D.C. and the mayor's office that provides grants to all these amazing groups in the city that has allowed for the murder rate to go down in the way that it has. And so if we continue to invest in these programs, and we also think of what are innovative ways that we can reduce firearm suicide, which is such a huge part of gun violence. 60% of total gun deaths every year are firearm suicide. Right. If we kind of come at this issue with a new and innovative approach that connects to what is actually going to make us safe and actually takes on the gun industry as an entity that has been solely focused on their profit with a complete disregard for our public safety. Right. That's a strong issue to run on, but it has to be done in a way that feels new and that is fresh and that doesn't just regurgitate the old ideas that have been permeating the conversation around this issue for so long. Because you're right, Tim. I mean, you made a great earlier point about when we say those ideas and we act like they're going to create some paradigm shift moment, if they would, it would have happened. And like, people just don't believe that it's going to make a real difference. And so politicians got to talk about what's a real plan that you have in place that's gonna make a difference. Even something simple. Like, Cam, we had the chance to work on with the Bernie campaign, like, making sure that mental health care is a part of Medicare for all so that you can get the mental health care you need and we can drive down suicide rates, including around firearms.

Tim Miller (46:35)

You know, how Republicans, you know, kind of do the thing where they're like, you MAGA Republicans, like, you've called us Nazis for so long that we, like, basically have had no choice but to become Nazis. Maybe that's the right path for you, Cam, like, or the Democrats just seize power and then say, you've told us you've called us gun grabbing authoritarians for so long that we weren't really before. But now we've had no choice and now we're sending jackbooted thugs to your door to take all your guns. What do you think about that, Cam? Is that a good idea?

Cam Kaskey (47:04)

Speaking of Nazis, I'm curious, Robert, with the amount of.

Tim Miller (47:09)

Ben. Well, that was Ben Shapiro. That was a joke in case anybody catches.

Cam Kaskey (47:14)

I'm curious in terms of the attention that you have given to the types of individuals who will commit acts of violence like this with this giant alt right shift we've seen with a lot of young men, the returning skyrocketing popularity of guys like Nick Fuentes who have been able to cultivate a bigger audience than ever. Do you think that this culture shift for young men that's becoming a lot more aggressive, intense and resentful of women and minorities is going to lead to larger acts of mass violence?

Rob Shentrup (47:46)

Well, I mean, Tim, just to your joke earlier, I mean, it is really.

Tim Miller (47:50)

Important to say that you're for authoritarians. You're foreign, authoritarian, gun grabbing, leftist.

Rob Shentrup (47:55)

I, I am not. And the reason why is it hasn't worked. Right. We've tried to ban drugs, we have tried to ban alcohol drugs, rushed the drug war. Yeah.

Tim Miller (48:05)

I mean, it was like, it was like it was kind of a trench warfare battle for a while.

Rob Shentrup (48:09)

It was.

Tim Miller (48:10)

And then the drugs just broke through the Maginot line and are just running roughshod on the.

Cam Kaskey (48:16)

A lot of drugs, by the way, coming in in through cartels that are able to so effectively do violence because of guns that come right over the border from the United States of America. We talk about all the things that are coming over the border from Mexico. Mexico is being ravaged by cartel violence. Mind you, the president is doing some very interesting things to stop it. The president of Mexico. Yeah, I might add. But so many of these cartels are able to hold power using weapons that were manufactured right here in the United States of America. So a lot of our cartel drug problem is pretty aggressively supported by our own manufacturing of the weapons that they use to dish out their violence. But again, like in classic Tim and.

Tim Miller (48:57)

Tim style, we both interrupted you twice, so you should actually say what you're going to say.

Rob Shentrup (49:01)

Yeah.

Cam Kaskey (49:01)

Are you concerned about the violent situation with the more isolated and angry young men?

Rob Shentrup (49:07)

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I am absolutely concerned about that. And the. Because one of the things that we've seen as the biggest. So there's a couple big marketing tactics that the gun industry uses.

Tim Miller (49:21)

Right.

Rob Shentrup (49:21)

One of them is that your second amendment right to own any gun you Want at any time. And. Right. Kind of like tying it to the Constitution in that way. And same thing with government tyranny. That's another marketing tactic. But we also see this around, right, the very now famous and infamous ad from Bushmaster of get your man card back. Right. That this was an ad saying, buy a gun and get your man card back. And so the gun industry has been tying this idea of what has been pushing this idea of what masculinity is that's very associated with a gun because they want people to say, when, when asked, right. Who are you to say, I'm a father, I'm a brother, and I'm a gun owner. Right. They wanted to be one of the top five things that people say. And so, I mean, the gun industry has been day one promoting lifestyle as a term of as, as a type of marketing. Right. We see that across all these industries now. But the gun industry has been doing that for the last 25, 30 years. And so it's, I mean, Cameron, you're obviously right. It's a huge concern. And there is a growing subset of people online who believe that committing violent acts are going to be the way that they get power and they get fame and they get notoriety and attention. And as there's increasing nihilism about the state of our world, that violence becomes more and more acceptable. And that's, and that's a huge, huge issue. And I mean, obviously a really existential threat to all of us into doing anything meaningful about the issue of gun violence. And so it is really frightening that things like political violence, right, like we saw just happen in Minnesota, that that thing feels like it's going to be more and more common. But it is something that is really important to also call out how the gun industry has only been continuing to profit off of and push this idea that to be a man means to own a gun.

Tim Miller (51:23)

Yeah. Final topics for you to boomer mailbag, the third way centrist third way, which, you know, has some, has some toots and boots for me. They're circulating a memo this morning about how all of the Democrats should stop using lefty activist words. They give a list of things they don't like. I don't think it's based on anything but their feelings. They don't like, you know, birthing person. They don't like environmental violence. They don't like microaggression. They don't like body shaming. Cameron does like body shaming. Rob, what would you say is the activist word that you like the least or the Most. Which one you find the most whimsical or the most annoying?

Rob Shentrup (52:11)

Yeah. Well, I really enjoyed when holding space blew up because that's something that I feel like is very much been a part of my world for a number of years.

Tim Miller (52:23)

And then you hold a lot of space.

Rob Shentrup (52:25)

Broke mainstream. Oh, I, I hold much. And so that was one to me that I always kind of felt weird about and didn't really use. And so it's really funny to see the way that people reacted to it. And kind of honestly, that's the one where I feel like my brain goes to first. But I mean, with a lot of those words, it's just if you can't have a conversation. Right. If I can't go to my family reunion and, and if I say that word and people just don't know what I'm saying. Right. That's a huge problem.

Tim Miller (52:54)

It's a bad word. Yeah.

Rob Shentrup (52:55)

When we as people who work in politics sound insane. Right. And sound and just use words that people don't understand, it doesn't help us at all.

Tim Miller (53:04)

Yeah.

Rob Shentrup (53:06)

And if we just focus on communicating clearly and using whatever words get us there, that's the thing that matters the most.

Tim Miller (53:12)

Yeah. Funny words are also good. Like dong.

Cam Kaskey (53:15)

Can I just say, this is. People also talk about your truth and somebody's own truth. And I, I use it unironically because I think that it is an effective way to communicate somebody's relationship with the truth, whether or not that is the objective truth. But otherwise we, we talk about holding space for someone's truth. I hold space for your truth. And I just wanted to show you all this is how much space I hold for Tim's truth. Every time Tim gives me truth, every time he truths to me, I hold. I mean, this is multiple universes and that's how much space.

Tim Miller (53:50)

It's kind of like when me and Toulouse talk and you do the thing where it's like, you know, I love you all the way to the moon. I love you. Through the multiple universes. We have space through the multiple universes. Final topic, boomer mailbag. Janet. 68 year old boomer boy. This is a sad one. She has four daughters. The two of the youngest are Gen Z. She wants to know why Zoomers are cutting their parents out of their lives. I'm on a couple of Facebook groups for estranged parents. All of us are boomers. Our estranged kids are all Zoomers. My two older daughters never did anything like this. What do you say to the Zoomers who are. I see this on TikTok as well. It's kind of a. It's kind of a common thing. And like, it's weird because it's like the person on the TikTok is like bragging about how great it is that they cut their parents out they've of their lives and how good that feels. And I'm watching it kind of being like, I see a sadness behind your eyes. I think when you say that, I mean, there are obviously exceptions to every rule. There's some really bad parents out there. But I don't know. What do you guys have to say about this, this trend?

Cam Kaskey (54:53)

I was gonna say, I am willing to believe that there are a lot more adults. Excuse me, There are a lot more children who become adults that stay too close to their parents in life in a way that they shouldn't. I think that there are a lot more relationships between young people and parents who are, in fact, emotionally abusive than there are instances where children are cutting out or young people are cutting out parents who don't deserve it. I personally believe, I always believe an individual's ability to change and to learn. And I don't think there's ever an age at which somebody is done growing up. And I think that adults, when their understanding of their life and their behaviors is challenged, if they are able to open themselves up to change, that should be welcomed and supported. And therefore, I don't like to deal in absolutes when I'm talking to people about how and when they should be distancing from people, especially in their family, which is very important to me. But again, I. I'm sure there are so many young people who are ghosting and icing out their parents in ways that they shouldn't be because they think it's going to give them some sorts, some sense of freedom and liberty that is ultimately spurious and only going to lead to sadness. I believe that a lot of those instances could probably find a happy medium where these people are able to keep family members at arm's length and say, yeah, these are the boundaries I'm going to draw. This is where you are and are not welcome into my life. And this can always change. You always have to leave the door open for things to change in a positive direction. But my immediate response to this woman is, I'm sorry to hear about what you're, what you've experienced. I hope you have not done anything egregious to deserve it. If you have done something to deserve it, I hope that you can grow and learn from the experience. But I also, again, Think that there's probably exponentially more cases of parents being kept around that actually should get quite a bit more distance than the other way around.

Tim Miller (56:52)

See, this is the zoomer mindset. I hear you. I think that's probably right too. There are, I think that there are examples of both balance in all things. You know, those are Eastern philosophy comes in. Do you have any final thoughts for us?

Rob Shentrup (57:03)

I mean, for me, I related this question because my parents and I's relationship when I was in high school and then the one that we have now are very different. And honestly having the reset period of going to college and I don't think I talked to them for like the first six months that I was in school. Like having that reset period was honestly great for our relationship. Just having the chance to kind of start fresh and almost like reset some of those boundaries was really important for us having a good relationship now. And so. Right. Cameron, I think you made a really good point. Right. If creating boundaries is important, but that happens in conversation and intention and in conflict. And that doesn't happen by cutting someone out of your life entirely. And so there's I think, important ways that you can like set your relationship to have it be something that works for both of you. But it is important to actually try and have those hard conversations about these are my boundaries. I need you to respect them and to set the relationship that's actually going to be fulfilling for the both of you.

Cam Kaskey (58:10)

Family is a very positive thing and it's something that could be extremely healing and it's support system that is, is crucial for a lot of people. But I also do know individuals who I've been close to in my life who have cut parents out because the parents were harmful to them in multiple different ways. And then years later and years later welcomed those parents back into the fold only to once again discover that that parents behavior has not changed. And I think that everybody is capable of growth and change. But I also think there's some individuals where they do not get the opportunity in life to do that. If that's individuals who suffer from mental health issues that they don't have the willingness or resources to deal with, whether that's people with substance abuse issues. If there's somebody who needs to be cut out due to substance abuse, they cannot come back in until they are at least taking some of the steps forward to manage those substance abuse issues. And I think that it's important when you let people back in if they were cut out because of harm that they were causing for you to be open and accepting to their capacity to change, but also to remember what they were capable of doing to you in the first place and recognize that these things can always happen again.

Tim Miller (59:27)

What wise zoomers we have here. Guys, this has been fypod for the week. I'm single parenting. Enjoy your life, enjoy your freedom this weekend because my husband's out of town. So I'm just. I'm surviving over here. I appreciate you guys very much. Everybody else will be back next week. Who knows who the guests will be? They won't be as good as Rob.

Cam Kaskey (59:51)

The guest will be, and it's going to be nuts. Rob, thanks so much. All my love to you, gang.

Rob Shentrup (59:56)

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