(WSVN/CNN/RNN) – Andy Pollack, the father of Meadow Pollack, one of the 17 killed in last week’s shooting at a Florida high school, said he won’t let his daughter’s death be in vain and that he intends to “make a difference.”
Pollack spoke forcefully at a group meeting at the White House with President Donald Trump on Wednesday.
“I’m very angry that this happened,” he said. “Cause it keeps happening. 9/11 happened once, and they fixed everything. How many schools, how many children have to get shot?”
The father, who was with his three sons, exclaimed at one point: “I’m pissed! Because my daughter I’m not going to see again. She’s not here.”
In an interview back at his home in South Florida, Pollack spoke positively about a private meeting with Trump in the Oval Office.
“The president was very accommodating and he understood the severity of what happened,” Pollack said. “We sat with him and we went over our concerns. We were showing him pictures of my daughter, so he could put a face with it. It’s not just one of the 17, it’s my kid, Meadow Jade Pollack, my kid.”
He added: “Now I don’t want anyone else to say ‘my kid’ that was murdered.”
The president has proposed a range of measures to combat school violence in the wake of the shooting, among them restrictions on bump stocks, raising the age to buy assault rifles and increasing security at schools, including possibly arming and training some teachers.
Pollack, for his part, said he was “on a mission” to make sure tragedies like this never happen again.
“I didn’t wake up thinking that this was going to happen on Valentine’s Day and think that I’m going to be thrown into this,” he said. “But I can’t just let my daughter’s death be in vain. I’m going to make a difference, for all the kids.”
Copyright 2018 WSVN via CNN. Raycom News Network staff contributed to this report. All rights reserved.
