Miami Gun Show - With an AR-15 variant in the foreground, customers examine firearms at a gun show in Miami, Florida on February 17, 2018. Andrew Innerarity / for NBC
MIAMI - Hundreds gathered at the fairgrounds here for a major gun show held just three days after the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, less than 50 miles to the north. Many came to the 500-booth expo with a renewed desire to protect themselves.
Miami Gun Show
The event, sponsored by Florida Gun Shows, is within driving distance of Parkland, where 17 students and staff were killed Wednesday when former student Nikolas Cruz allegedly opened fire with an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle.
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Jorge Fernandez, a manager who works on the gun show, says he expects a large turnout of gun enthusiasts at the weekend event.
"We don't want people to go out and buy guns and use them to kill people," Fernandez said. "But we have to understand that legally licensed gun owners have the right to defend themselves."
That's a sentiment shared by half of all Floridians, according to an October research study conducted by the University of South Florida after the Las Vegas and Pulse massacres.
The deadly shooting in Parkland has at least one gun dealer outraged by the systemic flaws that allowed Cruz to obtain an AR-15.
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"The government has to do their job and they dropped the bomb and it's very sad," said Keith Moroe owner of Pompano Gun and Pawn. "You're right, I'm scared every day. It could be my children, my grandchildren."
In Florida, described as one of the most lax states when it comes to gun restrictions, you have to be 18 to buy a rifle, but 21 to buy an actual handgun.
"It's just confusing," said a woman who identified herself only as Shaw. "The shooter was young enough to buy a gun, but not old enough to drink."
Speaking directly to elected officials at a vigil in Parkland earlier this week, Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel drew loud applause when he declared, "If you want to keep the gun laws as they are now, you're not going to get elected in Broward County. ".
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While there may be a climate change in the gun debate in parts of South Florida, there is no sign of that changing at the Florida Gun Show at the Dade Fairgrounds in Miami, which has drawn hundreds of gun enthusiasts across the state.
Despite harsh criticism of the timing of the event and scathing comments on social media, no protesters showed up at the event.
Talk of firearms often turns to the AR-15, which is one of the most popular firearms in the country and has an average price of less than a thousand dollars.
David Bustillos, a soldier in the National Guard, went to the expo to help his friend get a fair deal on an AR-15 before prices skyrocketed.
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Weighing in on the call for more gun control after the shooting at Marjory Douglas Stoneman High School, Bustillos said, "With the laws that are already in place, I think it's more than enough to have gun control."
"I don't agree with the gun law," he said as he stood outside the shuttered Sunrise Tactical and Ammunition, the store where the shooting suspect bought his gun. "People should be able to defend themselves."
Gun advocates at the show mostly point to the failures of the FBI and Broward County Schools for not acting on leads they may have had about the shooter months ago. Pain and grief continue for the 17 students and staff killed on the afternoon of February 14th during a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland. But something else is happening amid the anguish of the disrupted lives of victims and survivors. Out of agony, activism has emerged, and students from across South Florida are speaking together demanding stricter gun controls. Here is a list of grief counseling resources available to the community.
A family that entered the Miami gun show on Saturday simply held a sign that read "AR-15 4 For Sale."
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Florida Gun Show's full statement after the Parkland shooting. Copies of the letter were posted at the outside entrance to the gun show on Saturday.
Three days after 17 students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland were killed in the deadliest high school shooting in US history, a gun show in Miami went ahead as planned.
"We got a lot of calls—people asking us to cancel the show," said Scott Geisler, one of the managers who helped put on Saturday's show at the Miami-Dade County Fair and Exposition Center. “It's not like we did the show together last week. This show has been planned for five years. We have to reserve this building five years in advance."
Sponsors of the gun show, which typically draws more than 10,000 participants, did not consider canceling the event after the Parkland shooting. There were no visible protesters when a reporter was at the show, but Florida Gun Show officials said they had hired extra law enforcement just in case.
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It was the first gun show in the state since Wednesday's mass shooting. Vendors from Florida and other states sold ammunition, tasers and firearms and offered machine gun demonstration classes and National Rifle Association memberships.
"Some of the media is making this a gun issue and blaming the gun industry and blaming the AR-15, instead of blaming the actual criminal, Nikolas Cruz, or the mental issues, or whatever caused it. He did what he did," Geisler said. "It's not the guns."
According to the Broward County Sheriff's Office, Cruz admitted to using an AR-15 rifle in the mass shooting. A dozen people were injured in gunfire.
Jesse Marzoa, a customer at the gun show, only found out about the show on Friday. He came because he wanted to see the event in action. He did not reveal whether he owns the weapons or not.
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"As a substitute and future teacher, everything doesn't have to involve politics," he said. "Unfortunately, we think about politics before people."
Marzoa does not blame school shootings. He says it's about not getting help from the confessed attacker, Cruz.
Jaiden Bubel, 16, a junior in high school near Miami, came with his father, stepmother and younger sister to look for a gun for her father to have in his small business. "I was scared, but I want to support him, whatever happens, because I know he's not doing it for the wrong reason," Bubelex explained.
Her 7-year-old sister, Leiana Bubel, said coming to a gun show with the family made her feel safe, especially after hearing at her school about the shooting at Douglas High School. "I can learn how to use weapons," the second. "So if I ever need it, I'd already know how to use it."
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Caitie Muñoz, formerly Switalski, currently leads the Newsroom as Interim Managing Editor. Before transitioning to production directing, Caitie reported on the news for four years covering news and stories about the quality of life in Broward County and its municipalities.
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