Raising Minnesota’s Voices

“When we are organized, we can do something,” says Joan Peterson, national representative to the Board of Directors of the Brady Campaign, and a leading voice for Protect Minnesota, the result of an operating merger between Citizens for a Safer Minnesota and the Minnesota Million Mom March. Joan says that email activist campaigns have made all the difference in local advocates’ ability to build momentum to help pass strong gun laws – or defeat bad ones.

Minnesota’s gun violence prevention and other advocacy groups have pooled resources to pay for Democracy in Action, a web-based tool that makes possible an e-mail network and e-alerts to Congress. Joan admits that working together through the e-mail network “has made us stronger as a group. Since we are now using one state monthly e-mail and one state newsletter, we can call attention to issues as they come up in one voice.”
The fundraisers also helped cover the cost of Minnesota News Connection, a public radio program and news service. Joan and other advocates have helped shape MNC coverage of the gun violence issue. Joan was interviewed about the Fort Hood shootings recently. The story was picked up by local states and reached more than 700,000 listeners in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Fargo, North Dakota.

Minnesota’s united voices have also brought about major victories for common sense gun laws. This past summer, e-mail campaigns among the Minnesota groups helped put pressure on Senators Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar to vote against South Dakota Senator John Thune’s amendment on national concealed carry legislation. At a reception for the area’s nonprofit organizations attended by Senator Franken, Joan did a bee-line for the Senator and thanked him personally for his vote.

It has also made the difference in coordinating efforts quickly. The day that Todd Palin, husband of Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, showed up at a local gun store, Joan pulled together a group of protesters real fast through emails to multiple listservs.

“People came with signs. ‘Hunters for Obama’ were there, and then, it turned out so was National Rifle Association President Wayne Lapierre!” Joan did a television interview on the spot – with the rallied supporters behind her – and presented her contrasting view on the gun issue.

Joan witnessed the power of many voices when she went to Washington, DC in 2000 for the Million Mom March. “The march gave us a vehicle to talk about gun violence, to raise awareness about it.” Joan, whose sister was shot to death, recalls the T-shirts and signs commemorating loved ones. “There are a lot of us,” she remembers realizing that day. Joan met Mary Streufert, founding co-president of the Northland Chapter, at the march. Pictures of their loved ones were right next to each other.

The Northland Chapter is in Minnesota’s District 8, one of the Brady Campaign’s targeted districts to build long-term political support for common sense gun laws. The focus now is on H.R. 2324 and S. 843, the House and Senate bills to close the gun show loophole. Representative Jim Oberstar, a Democrat with a B+-rating from the NRA, holds the seat, and according to Joan’s conversations with him and his aides, the Congressman is open to learning more about legislative solutions to gun violence. Joan knows that the voices of victims and “gun guys” can be especially effective.

“We make sure they hear from victims and gun owners in the district. We’ve also forged relationships with our Mayors in Duluth, Minneapolis, and St Paul, as well as with law enforcement. And we let our legislators hear from us – from gun violence prevention groups and from other area organizations. We let them know that all of us are watching them and holding them accountable.”