Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark - "I Barely Survived Columbine." - Interview with Evan Todd

Episode Date: April 29, 2022

Evan Todd was the last person to speak to the Columbine High School shooters on April 20, 1999. In fact, he was the last person whose head had a gun pointed to it before the shooters turned the guns on themselves. On this chilling episode of The Spillover, Evan opens up to Alex Clark about what it was like to hear his classmates' last words, how the media has told this story wrong for 23 years, and why gun control activists can’t make a good argument.TRY MOINK HERE and get free filet mignon f...

I have been texting my best friend Lauren, who you guys know, from last week's episode of the spillover, and just planning every little detail about coming to the Young Women's Leadership Summit this year. That is the big conservative young women's conference that Turning Point USA puts on every single June. This year, it's June 2nd through 4th in Dallas, Texas. And I am like thinking, should we coordinate our outfits? You know, should we dress separately, not worry about each other, or really plan this out? So you'll have to see if you're coming in person, what we end. end up deciding to do. But hopefully you are figured out, you've figured out your travel,

you're ready to go, you're already thinking about your outfits, what to wear, and all of that stuff. If you are still hesitating on going, because you're like, well, I don't have a Lauren to bring with me. I'm going to be going totally alone. I went totally alone my first YWLS in 2018. So do not hesitate. You have not that much time left, okay, to get signed up for this. So go to TPSA.com slash YWLS. You can get 25% off your team. ticket with code poplitex. That's TPSA.com slash YWLS, code poplitex. Today's episode depicts graphic descriptions of gun violence and suicide. Listener discretion is advised. It started off as just a Tuesday morning on April 20th, 1999 in Littleton, Colorado, as these

things go. Students were going about their normal lives, class, library, studying, passing notes, anticipating lunch. Graduation was just around the corner. You can practically taste summer by the end of April. American culture had not yet been defined by school shootings, as we know them today. But around 11.19 a.m., the way America viewed schools and gun laws changed drastically. More importantly, lives were forever turned upside down when two students donned in trench coats wreaked havoc upon their high school. They failed to detonate a bomb, but managed to carry out a killing spree resulting in the loss of 13 people

and severely injuring more than 20. The library was a central location for the catastrophic ordeal. Many of the victims never left the library that day. But today's guest miraculously walked away after being the last person to speak to the shooters. He's since become an advocate for the Second Amendment and increased school safety,

here to tell his harrowing story of surviving one of the deadliest shootings in America Columbine is Evan Todd. Please welcome Evan to the spillover. So before we get into the specifics of that day in particular, Evan, I don't want to give the shooters a spotlight or name them or anything, but I do want to understand a little bit of what you were dealing with with them on campus. I mean, prior to April 20, 1999,

what do you remember about the shooters and their relationships? Like, did they have a friend group? Did they have girlfriends? What was it like going to school with them? So I was a sophomore and they were seniors. And so I had seen them in school before. And they did affiliate with the group that was known as the Trenchcoat Mafia. Or at least they were perceived to associate with them.

And, you know, they were just a group of kids who were all black. They were transcoats. They just were kind of into that. off and dark scene, but I really didn't know them. I remember a few months before the shooting, I had one interaction with them, and it was the only interaction I ever had. I was walking through the hallways. It was during a class period, so the hallways were empty, except for myself, and the two of them. And they were walking down the hall. We were walking towards each other, and they were joking, laughing, talking back and forth to each other. I don't even know what they

were saying. And as I walked by, I just kind of nodded. my head and they kept laughing and they walked on. And that was really the only interaction I ever had with them. I mean, people say that they were bullied, which is why they decided to do this. Had you ever heard of that, of them being bullied? I mean, was it like superficial stuff? Like people just calling them names or were they being like physically bullied? You know, I, this is a narrative that has bothered me from the very beginning because I think is a false narrative. You know, I don't doubt that they were bullied.

I was bullied. Like, I don't know a single kid who went through high school without being bullied at some time. And yes, some people get bullied to different degrees. And I agree that bullying is wrong. Like, that's something we should teach our kids to not do. You know, but the narrative that they were bullied and that's why they did this really bothers me because it almost, to me, it's actually perpetuated the problem.

in a way, society said bullying is, or I guess murder is second to bully. Like it gave, I think, people subconsciously, especially people who have some mental issues or have been bullied, almost a green flag. Like, oh, people will understand. I was bullied. And so that overarching theme really bothers me. But, you know, what I witnessed at Columbine, I never saw crazy amounts of bullying. Yeah, I saw it at times, and I even stopped some bullying at times, some from the Trenchcoq Mafia at one point.

But, you know, and I'm not an angel. I'm not saying I was perfect either, but there's, you know, that whole narrative is just false, and it's not the reason why they're school shootings. Did students know that these guys had violent desires? Was that well known or just completely caught everyone off guard? I think for the most part, And knowing what I know now, you know, hindsight's 2020.

Not everyone knew that they were violent, but some did. The teachers had reported one of the two writing an essay about being a bullet and killing people. One of the families, and actually a friend of theirs, Brooks Brown, the Brown family had called the sheriff's department on them on the two murders prior to the shooting. because they had threatened to kill him. The school knew about some of their violent writings because of their work in class. But see, a lot of this, at the time, too, in the 90s, people dismissed the things that kids were saying and doing

as just going through a phase. That was actually the big term. Like, oh, they're just going through a phase, and they accepted it. And I think now we look back and there are red flags. And it's sad to see because a lot of times we see these school shooters. I mean, heck, like down in Parkland, they had, I don't know how many contacts with the FBI. Right.

And these are almost predictable. And it's sad because when there's a threat, they don't deal with the threat. And they don't take the threat seriously. like, you know, threatening to murder someone, that's a crime in itself that should be followed up on and pursued, which could eventually prevent one of these horrible things from happening. Take me back to that day, 23 years ago, now this month. Was there anything about that morning that seemed off to you? Did you have any sort of intuition or sense that something catastrophic was about to happen?

You know, the bizarre thing is it was in the fall of 98, I received, I was a Boy Scout and I used to get this monthly magazine that they shipped out to Boy Scouts. And there was a story about an Eagle Scout in Oregon who had tackled a school shooter who had came into their school. And he tackled him while the shooter was trying to murder other students. And I remember reading that story thinking, oh my God, like, who would go into a school and shoot someone? That was the first time that scenario had ever been on my mind. And I remember thinking like, wow, like, would I do that in that situation? And I remember thinking about it. And then time went by, you know, six, eight months went by.

And on that day, I was actually the only one standing up in the library. for two reasons. I had a chair. I was holding a chair thinking, well, if he comes, this is all I have. I'm going to try and whack him because I, when it first started, I only thought there was one shooter instead of two. And I also felt trapped. So I knew that if I was standing, I could run in either direction. There was two exits out of the library. So it was something that I had thought about mildly, but I never, obviously, I never thought it would happen in my life. And so you end up in the library like you're describing, which is where this all takes place and actually the most people were injured and killed in the library where you were. And so were you in there just by a horrible coincidence that you had just randomly chosen to go into the library that morning? Or were you supposed to be in there for something? It's actually kind of a funny story. it's partly because I'm a procrastinator and I had a report due that afternoon for one of my English classes

so I had to finish writing that. And then secondly, I was also a goof off. And I had gotten in trouble a few weeks earlier and our lunch period was kind of split up into sections. And because I had gotten in trouble, my football coach asked me, he said that you have to go up to the football field at lunchtime and do, I think we were doing like, I don't know, two miles or running and me and another classmate.

And so we were supposed to meet him up at the school track at lunchtime to, you know, do our punishment. And we were hiding from him that day because we didn't feel like, we didn't feel like doing it. We thought, well, we can go to the library. We can do our report. He won't look for us there. And so that's why we were there, me and one of my friends.

But yeah, that's where most of everything that happened, most of the people who were injured or murdered, the library was the epicenter. In the library, could you hear other gunshots going off around the school, or was it you had absolutely no idea until they came in? Yeah, it was just a little after 11, and we heard this loud explosion. and I remember hearing it and I looked out the windows of the library and I saw some smoke coming up and the first thing that I thought of was a car crash because that's kind of what it sounded like and so I got up to look at where the smoke was coming from I later learned it was a pipe bomb that had gone off and as I'm looking out the window I heard gunshots and I you know I had heard gunshots before being a Boy Scout

and had shot in guns before. And that's when it just kind of struck me like, this is not normal. And I remember looking around the library at people's faces. And some people were oblivious, still laughing, not paying attention. But you could see that some people had recognized

something wasn't right. And you could see that there was a lot of confusion and fear. And so we heard the gunshots outside they moved in towards the school. We could hear them echoing through the hallways. And the library, there was one door that went to the hallway, and there was one door that went to the outside of the school. And they were both open.

And because of the echo, it sounded like the gunshots were coming from all around us. So no one at that time left the library because we felt like we were surrounded. But as they got closer, a teacher ran. in Patty Nielsen and she was bleeding from her shoulder and she said everyone get down there's kids with guns get under the tables get down she ran over the library's desk which was pretty close to where I was at and she called 911 and as she's telling everyone to yell you know yelling to get down the we could hear the gunshots closer in the hallway and I was standing behind a pillar and I looked around the pillar and one of the

two murders was standing in the doorway. He caught, we made eye contact and he lowered his rifle and pumped around and shot. And as he was lowering his shotgun, I started to jump. And as he fired, I was hitting a lower left side of my back. And I landed behind this Xerox machine and a desk. And I hear two more shots just go over my head. and it hit the desk in front of me and it blew shrapnel and ricochet back into my face and my neck. And that's when they came in.

What were they saying when they were walking into the library? Well, they did. They yelled everyone get up. You know, they talked a lot actually in the library. They talked a lot. They laughed a lot. They mocked people. I said some very disgusting.

and vile things about Isaiah Shoals after they had shot him in the head. And he was an African-American student, right? Yeah, yeah, he was. And he, you know, they said, look at this inwards brains. You know, there are people who were pleading to God, praying to God. And they mocked God, they laughed at it. They question people why they believed in God, if they believed in God. And at times that even their conversation went down the rabbit hole to one point,

they even said that they were God. And yeah, it was bizarre because there was laughing and hooping and hollering. And then there'd be just outburst of rage. And so, and in between all this, they were just walking around shooting people at random. murdering people execution style. And that went on for around seven, seven and a half minutes. Was anyone trying to talk to them or they were just totally silent praying that they were going to not notice them or come up to them?

Some of that, some of this I've learned from, you know, after the effect, during the shooting, I did hear people pleading no, no, no. You know, people crying out for their parents. And in the aftermath, I learned that there were people who just played dead, acted like they were already shot. You know, Kyle Velazquez was sitting in his chair still, just frozen when he was shot and murdered. and so

yeah I mean it was it was the most horrific thing and the whole time you're thinking this has got to you know this is someone's got to come in and stop this you know and at this time

we myself I knew at this time that there was two of them because I had heard their conversations and you know gunshots coming from different directions but at this time I had crawled around the librarian's desk into one of the footholes, just trying to hide,

and so that they wouldn't see me. But eventually they came around the library's desk and saw me, pulled the chair out, and one of them kneeled down, and he put a gun up to my head, and he said, why shouldn't we kill you? And I told him, look, I've been good to you and everyone at this school and you know it. and he said a few things, turned to the other ones that you can kill him if you want to. They kind of looked at each other for a moment. And that was a real bizarre moment for me as well

because they had just walked around murdering people. And when they asked why they shouldn't kill me, that conversation that went on, something changed in them. I saw their eyes change their, even their appearance change. Something changed in their mind. And I don't know what it was if it was, you know, I think it was divine intervention. But I later learned that that was essentially it.

They didn't shoot at or kill any more students after that. What had happened at Columbine was essentially over. They walked around the school. They actually looked into classrooms into the doors with windows and saw students and students saw them. And they just kept walking. They went down to the commons, our cafeteria. They tried to blow up the propane tanks that they had brought in and were unsuccessful.

And then they went back to the library a while later and committed suicide. When they, the suicide, do you think that they each shot themselves or they shot each other? like yeah that's that's something that's been debated and and I don't really remember what the actual official report was um i really don't know i could see it going either way i mean i think both of them were sick mentally morally um and and so i could see them you know one shooting the other um you know there's a there's been a discussion since Columbine with if one was a leader over the other, I don't know that to be the case.

They sounded pretty, I don't know, mutually despicable during that day. So they may have killed one and then the other and then shot themselves, but yeah, that I don't know. Since this was 1999, I mean, this was before everyone had a cell phone and things like that. So were kids trying, do you know, to like write quick notes to their families or anything while this was going on? Did you ever hear of anything like that? Yeah, there were people who, I don't know about the notes. But yeah, cell phones weren't as popular. A few people had cell phones.

But the thing is, I had a cell phone at the time. And it was in my backpack, so I didn't have it with me. But I remember trying to use it, you know, that day and the days after. And when I could get a call through to someone, all the lines were busy because people, I mean, that was really the only line of communication. You know, nowadays you can go on, you know, 50 different social media apps or whatever. And there's an infrastructure for it. But everything essentially melted down where the cell towers were just full. So if you got through, you usually got a busy signal when you're trying to talk to someone.

texting really hadn't really caught on. And most of the time, you couldn't even get a call to get a business signal because there just wasn't any bandwidth on the cell tower. Whoa. Okay. Well, I read a few articles saying how some parents did not even know that something had happened until it was after school and their kid hadn't shown up. Not necessarily because they had died, but just, you know, they were stuck at school or whatever, you know. And so is that true? Some parents had no idea for hours that this had gone down.

Yeah, I believe it. You know, that the late 90s was kind of the turning point in media and, you know, social media really didn't exist. But people didn't let, you know, they weren't glued to their, to the current events like they are now, like Fox News, breaking, CNN, this and that pushing like drama 24-7. So most people just live normal lives. and if they watched the news, it was just like the 5 o'clock or 10 o'clock news or whatever it was back then. And so, yeah, people were kind of oblivious until word spread and word spread kind of the old-fashioned way.

People would tell each other, they'd call each other, and then the news picked up. But that kind of, I think that did change. That was a change in media itself because, you know, by the time I had gotten out of this school, the news cameras were on the corners of the neighborhoods, the local ones at least. And so, you know, and they were streaming it through the CNN and Fox News who were airing it live. And I think that was kind of one of those turning points where people were watching, not just hearing about something that had happened in the retrospect, that they were living through a tragedy. And this came, you know, full circle come 9-11, too. people watched as the second plane hit the towers and they just watched tragedy unfold instead of

hearing and learning about it. Yeah, I was six years old when Columbine happened and it's the first major tragedy that I remember watching on the news in my life. Yeah, I can relate because I think the Oklahoma City bombing was that for me, you know, I think I was maybe 10. And we didn't obviously watch it live, but I remember seeing the reports going on the TV all afternoon once I got home, and then there was the man hunt. And that was really kind of one of those first things where I was witnessing current events unfold live. And that was kind of bizarre. It's no secret that what we're doing here at Turning Point USA with shows like the spillover and Poplittics, it's really exciting. And so I get asked all the time if we're hiring. So you want to know

what it's like to work with me? Well, it's as great as having a massive thick boy box a moink meat delivered to your door. That's moo plus oink. Moink. It's a meat subscription box company that you've probably seen on Shark Tank, and everyone on my team who works with me for the spillover is begging me to share with them because, you know, I get this huge box and it's full of grass-fed and grass-finished beef and lamb, pastured pork and chicken, wild cod Alaskan salmon, just to name a few of items. And so they're all wanting me to share it. I cave. I give some salmon to one of my producers for the spillover and guess what? He makes the salmon and risotto invites another member of my team over to eat it and doesn't invite me. Here's the deal. Try moink if you want melting your mouth beef,

chicken and pork. Just know that your friends will choose the meat over you every time. I'm just kidding. Well, sort of. I love moink and you will too. Keep a. America Farming by signing up at moinkbox.com slash spillover right now and cute servatives will get free filet mignon for a year. That's one year of the best steak you'll ever taste, but for a limited time, highly recommend the ribby. That's m o'inkbox.com slash spillover. That's moinkbox.com slash spillover. How long did you guys have to stay in the school before you were rescued? So I was lucky when they left that library, I got up and I remember whispering. I said, is anyone alive?

And the library is filled with smoke from the bombs and gunshots. And I looked out and I just saw lifeless, motionless bodies lying on the floor. and I whispered it because I learned afterwards that my hearing had basically shut down temporarily. The investigators told me that the fire alarm was going off. You know, there are people crying and screaming, but I heard nothing. And so it's a natural, you know, physical reaction that happens to people. But I whispered that and no one answered. And so I made my way back towards the back of the library and then within a few,

seconds made my way on the way out of the library. And I ran out and there was just dozens of students behind a police car, dozens more behind a little utility shed that was outside. And that's where a lot of people who were wounded had made their way too. So there's a lot of victims who had been shot. And we started transporting the people that could. to a nearby cul-de-sac in a neighborhood that backed up to the school. And eventually I ended up making it from that cul-de-sac to a friend's house down the street to my parents' house,

which was just a neighborhood away, and then I made it to the ER after that. But the ambulances, you know, we prioritize for the people who were really bad. But one of the miracles that day that I learned, too, was that every single, single person who was shot who made it to a hospital survive. Oh, wow. Yeah. And so that's like, it's one of the things that I've learned since then is, you know, the medical response in a tragedy like this is huge.

You know, if you can stop the bleeding, stabilized victims and help get them to the hospital, the chances of their survival just grow exponentially. So that's one of the things that I do these days is I advocate for arm teachers. There's a lot of things, but also to get people medical training so that if they're ever caught up in something such as this or even an accident on the playground or car wreck, you know, if you have the basics first aid skills to help stop the bleeding, you can save someone's life because modern medicine is just miraculous in how they can recover patients from trauma. Absolutely. Yeah, it's incredible what you do and what you've been advocating for and

just your activism, which I do want to get into. I have a question, which is, it's crazy that I'm having you on because this was just a mutual friend of ours reached out to me. She's like, you know, this is the month anniversary of, call on mine, you've got to talk to my friend, Evan. And I was like, oh my gosh, yes. So we kind of made it happen so that your episode could come out now this week, you know, within April. And I had just, been talking about to my followers on Instagram, Cassie Bernal's story. And I remember being a young millennial growing up in church, my youth group was all reading. She said yes. There was a huge culture thing in church in the early 2000s was talking about her story and then challenging students. If you were

in this situation, would you say yes if somebody questioned your faith? And that was like a whole thing. And then, you know, I'm like nine years old thinking, would I say yes? You know, if I was in the situation and stuff. So then I found out that there is a whole controversy about this book and that allegedly there was a, it was another student. It wasn't even Cassie who had said yes when the shooters asked her about her faith. And so can you just explain this and what the controversy is and what the truth is? So I'll, I'll tell you the facts that I know because I don't even know if I know the truth, to be honest. And I was there. Um, uh, I'll, I'll, I'll tell you the facts that I know. I know. I'm I heard many people pleading and praying to God.

I heard people who had been shot saying, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. And I think that kicked off a lot of the conversation from the murderers as to all the God questioning and mocking. You know, why do you believe in God? You know, and they, you know, they said some very expectable things. And so I heard a lot of conversations, and I heard a lot of people respond to things. And so at this time, I was listening under the library's desk.

I didn't see what was going on at that moment. And so I didn't know where the different students were who were in question until after the fact. And I couldn't tell you from just my, you know, like triangulation. of where the sounds were coming from of who is who. And so I really don't know, but I don't doubt that, I don't doubt that Cassidy, from my perspective, said or didn't say what she did. And I don't doubt that there was more than one student who did that as well,

because I did hear several conversations on that line. So that is kind of a tough one to answer, and I don't know if I could. I read some reports that allegedly some police had hesitated to come in into the school longer than they should have. Would that be fair to say? Oh, it's absolutely fair to say. And I actually was involved in a lawsuit pertaining to this because there were officers who had, there was a school resource officer who had engaged him outside. And when they went in, he did not follow suit. And there were other officers, even from other jurisdictions who came and started to go into the school and were called back out.

Why? Because, and this is the thing that I learned through the lawsuit, too, is in the moment, I believe that they were doing what they believed was the right thing. You know, school shootings were very rare. There had been a few before. but the the protocols for what was going on was to surround the perimeter and wait to do negotiations because they were used to like hostage situations and things like that so I don't fault them in the moment because you know they're human they were going off of what they had known you know you can't expect someone to be perfect the moment they need to be all the time and so that's one

of the things that I give credit to the law enforcement community is they looked at what happened at Coleman and he said, no, this is the worst protocol to contain. And that's where the active shooter protocols of various names were instituted in police departments

where they go in and they go after the active shooter. And that has saved countless lives over the years. Well, the same thing happened in Parkland too with that police officer, you know, being scared to go in and listening to the gunshots go off inside the school. Yeah. And this is, you know, this is a perfect example. There's, and there, and there's

plenty of examples that actually don't make the news very widely where school resource officers have either prevented or immediately stopped the school shooting. And they don't get the headlines because, well, the gun groups aren't pushing them because they are, you know, using them for a clinical means. So there are a lot of great resource officers. In fact, I have some friends that I grew up with who went to Collin Mine, who are school resource officers. And they're invaluable. But on the same token, they're all human.

And that day, they could be, you know, two years from retirement or that day, they could be, you know, something can happen. And no one's perfect. And that's why I, and that's another reason why. I advocate for school, teachers, and staff to be armed because redundancy is key in these kind of situations, having more than one person. You can ask any law enforcement or military, how do you win a gunfight? You bring more guns. I mean, as bizarre as it sounds, the more people you have on your side to stop a threat, the better. And that's just the fact of life,

even if it's uncomfortable for some to realize. How long were you guys out of school before being allowed to come back and resume a normal school schedule? So Columbine closed down for the summer. We did resume school. I can't remember now, but I think it was within a week or two at a neighboring school. We shared with our rival school, actually, Chaffield. And they went in the morning from like 8 to noon, and we went from like noon to 4. And it really wasn't school because there's only a few weeks left.

We just kind of gathered together, talked, you know, and spent time with each other just so that I think, you know, that we weren't alone dealing with what we had just gone through. But we did the following fall go back to school. And it was, it was, it was, it was something that I didn't know how it was going to go. going back into the school. They had remodeled and repaired all the bolt holes. They closed off the library that year, so it was just walled off. And so that was something where you'd walk by the hallway and you knew that's where everything happened, but that space was still there.

But eventually going back to school, you know, made me recognize that I had more good memories there than bad. And so, yeah, that was something that was definitely, I think a stepping stone to overcoming and dealing with the tragedy was kind of to face it and to realize that life does go on. Were there some students who were completely yanked out and pulled out of school by their parents that never returned, like ads in, you know, they were homeschooled or just went to to a whole other school or anything? Yeah, absolutely.

there was quite a few who went to other neighboring schools or homeschool. Yeah, and there was almost 2,000 students that were there. I don't know the numbers of who returned. But it, you know, that's 2,000 people who kind of, who all had a different perspective, who had a different experience, who, you know, who dealt with it in different ways. it's really amazing to see how the same tragedy can lead to so much either heartache and devastation or good. And I mean that in the sense that there's so many people who came out of Columbine who, like I said, either became school resource officers or there's a ton of nurses and doctors that came from that.

And some of that stems from that day. there's people who became teachers and, you know, public speakers, motivational speakers, bloggers, you know, the good that has come from that day, youth ministries and all kinds of stuff is far outweighs the evil that was done that day. Did you ever struggle with Survivor's guilt? Yeah, I think, honestly, I think if you, you know, read through a psychology book, I struggled with all of them. them, you know, there were, there were good days, bad days. Yeah, there's times where you think, like, why did I make it? You know, and so it's something that, I think, no matter what it is, whether it's this, you know, at school shooting or the loss of the loved owner or any other

kind of traumatic event, I think, I think for me, it's just working through it is how you get through it. And so, you know, and so I also was blessed where because I was outspoken, I traveled a lot and talked about what happened at Columbine. In my experience, and I also responded to other tragedies just to be a, you know, an ear for someone to talk to. But because of my travels and my experiences, I was able to meet, you know, firefighters from 9-11 and survivors from the Oklahoma City bombing, World War II heroes, and Holocaust survivors, and just some of the most motivational people that have walked the earth. And so I was blessed in that I saw how people overcome horrible events in their lives and how they can turn it not only from something bad, but something truly good. And so the fact that I immersed myself in these people's experiences and lives, I think,

was most beneficial for myself. And so, you know, I looked at, I looked at that and just thought, you know, people really could put themselves in other people's shoes and see the power, that, the human willpower and desire to survive. And especially in that from Hawkins, Holocaust survivors. It really is empowering. I look at every single, almost every single mass shooting that we've had that, you know, people can think back on this last generation. And it just seems like every single time there were warning signs.

Like you talked about with the shooters at Columbine. There had been blog posts of them threatening to shoot kids. And the police had been notified. Parkland, the police had been notified. So in all these different situations, I mean, we have that evidence that things fail at the state and local level. And yet people still want to implement stronger gun control laws. What do you say about that?

Yeah. Well, and I think, you know, there may be a nefarious plot by the power brokers who pull the strings to, you know, not focus on And it's pretty evident to not focus on the problem and just go after the guns. That's the political goal. You know, take, for example, Bloomberg, every town, Moms Demand Action. They spend millions of dollars trying to take guns away from people who have done nothing wrong. And at the same time, they have not spent a single cent to try and protect our schools. They haven't spent a single moment trying to make our schools safer from the,

people who are actual threats. And all they do is they try and divert the problem, divert the topic to take guns away, where if they really wanted to solve the school shooting problem, with the millions of dollars and the people behind it, we, I think we could come together and find ways to make our schools safer, but they don't want that. They just want to take guns away. And so I think that's a huge problem because they have the media on their side. They have the narratives.

they have, you know, they're controlling the social media, the big media, when in fact, you know, the problem is, is our schools are being attacked and we're not protecting them. I mean, it's like if we got in a car accident and we thought, oh, we need to just ban all cars. Like, no, we just need to have better training, have, you know, better driver's safety. We need to have better car safety. Like, those are the things that are the problem. But well, what are realistic steps that schools should be taking to prevent school shootings from happening? If it's not stronger gun control measures, which by the way, I don't know a school in America that's not a gun-free zone at this point.

You know, if it's not that, then what is it that they should be doing? So there's several things that, and I think it has to start with the parents. The parents really need to demand it. They need to demand that every day that they drop their child off at school, they want their child to be protected every single second. that they're there. We are entrusting them with not only in their minds, but their lives. And so parents need to be very vocal. And for instance, in the state of Colorado, we have gun-free zone laws because that's a national law that coincidentally started with Joe Biden's crime bill. It's more than changed over the years with the bills, but that's essentially what

gave us the gun-free zones around schools, which should be repealed at the national level. But locally, like in Colorado, we have a state law. that allows school staff to carry firearms if they're trained, properly and vetted and all that. And so, and there's other states that have similar provisions. So as a parent, you need to ask your school boards and principals is this,

and also look at the state laws to see if it's, if it's possible in your state. And you need to demand that you should have school teachers, administrators, staff to be armed and trained. And that's kind of a whole process, but that's the first thing that parents really need to start looking into at the school board level. And if there's school boards who are hostile to it,

which we've all seen over the last few years, then yeah, it's tough, but maybe that's time for parents to stand up and say, we need to take over the school board so that we can protect our children. And I think that's the only way that it'll really happen. I think school choice would help because there's a lot of charge. schools and private schools who do protect their their schools. In fact, every school that has over the

last 20 years, I think there's been a thousand schools who have had armed teachers. Not a single school shooting there, not a single one, not a single incident, not a single injury, not a single murder. And so if you allow parents and communities to protect their children, they will. The federal law is just the only thing it's doing is hindering and stopping parents and communities. from protecting their schools and children. So that's got to go, but parents have to start at the bottom. That's number one. Number two, I'd say I would get everyone in the school as far as faculty staff

trained on basic first aid, CPR, you know, T-T-T-T-T-T, C, which is, you know, like a trauma combat type training to stop the bleed. Yeah. And those are just some of the steps that I think they could take that would greatly enhance, you know. And then on, and that's just, there's two ways I look at this problem. It's like a cancer to me. There's ways to prevent cancer and there's ways to treat it.

That's how you treat it. You have to have someone to go in and physically kill the cancer when it arrives. And then there's ways to prevent it. And I really think the anti-bullying programs have been destructive. And I could go on and all about that. Well, give us a summary because that's interesting to me. What's like a quick summary of how have anti-bullying programs been destructive in your eyes? So I actually, the way I see things unfolding in America today doesn't surprise me.

I couldn't have predicted it. And I say that because anti-bullying, what it essentially did was it told kids, you need to treat me this way because this is the way I want to feel. And so what they did was they reversed the responsibility, the individual responsibility of, you need to take responsibility for your own actions because people might be mean to you. People might be rude to you. People might even be physically harmful to you. But you need to control your own actions.

The bullying, anti-bullying campaign basically said, okay, you as an individual need to go tell everyone else how they need to treat you. But don't worry about your own actions. You need to focus on other people's actions. And I think that's why we see a lot of the pronoun stuff and the, you know, you need to treat me this way. And so I think it's changed the responsibility of our own actions and behaviors is the best way I could put it in a nutshell. That's absolutely fascinating.

I don't think I've ever heard anyone kind of put it that way. Yeah. And not only that, I think the anti-bullying, too, it promoted the idea that, we need to do this because kids are going to shoot up to school. So then it also reinforced the idea that murder is second to bully. And that's not the case. The most despicable thing that happened at Columbine was two kids went in and murdered, 13 people. And that's not the narrative that's being told.

The narrative is, hey, you better be next to people. People are going to come shoot up the schools. And so just the little nuances in our messaging has, I think has a huge impact on our children and our society. And so that's why, like I said, in a nutshell, why I don't like the anti-bullying campaigns. We didn't need anti-bullying campaigns 100 years ago when we just taught children how to be respectful and how to treat other people and how to take responsibility for their own actions and what is right and what is wrong. I don't think it's any surprise that as we've removed God from schools, even the many,

of God from schools, the worst things get. You know, people say, oh, we have a mental health crisis. Well, yeah, we have a mental health crisis. We have a spiritual crisis because, you know, these kids have no compass as to what is right and what is wrong. They have no direction. You know, everything is fine. Everything is acceptable as long as the powers that be demon.

And that can change at any moment's notice. And that's not true, that's not a true moral compass that will guide you to a good place. And so, you know, when they say there's mental health issues, yeah, well, it stems from a moral decay in our schools. And that's another reason, you know, you ask me, how do we prevent it? Get your kids out of public schools. I mean, that's the number one thing until we can reform them or get, you know, school vouchers or some ways. because I think that parents would solve this problem, but at every turn, local, state, and federal governments

are standing in the way from parents from solving these problems that are plaguing our schools, whether it's the school shootings, whether it's the suicides, whether it's the depression, the anxiety. You name it. These kids are under attack from all angles, spiritually, mentally, physically. Like, it is disgusting. And yet we allow the teachers union to keep pushing their agendas in our communities.

It's nothing but destructive. So well said, Evan. You've done a lot of activism and advocacy for school safety in the Second Amendment, like working with organizations like Bullets Both Ways. Could you talk about what they do or some other organizations that you really love that people may want to get involved in if this is their passion point, like I really want to be an advocate for school safety that makes sense. Yeah.

Yeah, Bullets both ways is great and great American brand. They make hats and t-shirts, which help fun the training for school staff to get the medical and firearm training to keep school safe. They primarily work with another organization, Faster Colorado, who trains teachers, staff. They actually go through the three-day class. This training is, you know, top of the line. It's the same training that law enforcement gets. In fact, it's harder than the training that law enforcement gets. gets they have to go through the same qualification, but they have to do it with two more shots

than fire that law enforcement has to qualify it with. So, you know, they're getting top-notch firearms training, scenario training, medical training, and it's a great organization. And there are tons of organizations throughout the United States that are at the state level that are doing both the firearm training, the medical training. You know, if you want to, there's some that I have contacts to. If you want to reach out to me. Yeah, what is your contact if people want to either invite you to speak, you know, for their organization or on their college campus or just to contact you if they want to learn more?

Yeah, I have, I do have a website, Evan M. Todd.com. Evan, E-V-A-N-M as in Michael, T-O-D-D-D.com. And I'm also up on social media, mainly Instagram now. But Evan M. Todd, at Evan M. Todd on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. Reach out if there's anything I can do to help make your community safer or to help protect the lives or liberty of anyone in your life, please let me know because that's what I do. You're awesome, Evan.

Thank you so much for coming on the spillover. Thank you. It's been 23 years this April since Columbine. But for millions of people all over the world, they remember that day in vivid detail like it was yesterday. Rest in peace, Cassie, Daniel R., Daniel M., Isaiah, William, Rachel, John, Matthew, Lauren, Kelly, Stephen, Kyle, and Corey. Also, Carla, who committed suicide in October 1999. Greg, who committed suicide in May 2000, and Austin, who passed away in May 2019 after a long addiction to opioids.

This episode is dedicated to the lives lost as a result of this unspeakable tragedy, as well as every survivor and the countless others who knew them and loved them. We will never forget. I'm very proud to host the spillover and the thought-provoking guests and conversations that we're able to have every single week. New episodes post on Thursdays at 9 p.m. Pacific, midnight Eastern on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. and you can watch each episode by subscribing to Poplitics on YouTube.

Please leave a five-star rating if you support the work that we're doing and share this episode if you felt like questions were answered for you today about the Columbine shooting that you've always wondered about. I'm Alex Clark, and this is The Spillover. I love you. Mean it. Bye.