Groups Sending Congress Gun Control Pleas Via AI-Generated Voices of the Dead

As part of a campaign launched by March for Our Lives and Change the Ref, lawmakers are receiving pleas for gun control via the AI-generated voices of people killed in shootings.

CNN reported that one of the AI-generated voices is that of Joaquin Oliver, a student killed in the February 14, 2018, Parkland high school shooting.

When a call is placed using the AI-generated voice meant to represent Oliver, lawmakers hear:

Six years ago, I was a senior at Parkland. Many students and teachers were murdered on Valentine’s Day that year by a person using an AR-15 assault rifle. It’s been six years, and you’ve done nothing. Not a thing to stop all the shootings that have continued to happen since.

The thing is, I died that day in Parkland. My body was destroyed by a weapon of war. I’m back today because my parents used AI to recreate my voice to call you.

The gun control group Change the Ref was founded by Oliver’s father, Manuel, who said:

My wife and I have been trying to use our voices for the last six years. Nonstop. We have tried almost every single way to approach gun violence in a way that people will pay attention. We haven’t been very successful.

…

So we decided, you know what? Let’s bring the voices of our loved ones. Let’s bring the voice of Joaquin.

The Parkland shooting was carried out by a 19-year-old who bought his gun by passing a background check, according to the Sun Sentinel. And the 19-year-old used only ten-round magazines in carrying out the heinous act.

On March 1, 2018, the Miami Herald noted that Florida state Sen. Laura Book (D) indicated the Parkland shooter “went in with only 10-round magazines because larger [magazines] would not fit in his duffel bag.”

Background checks and magazine capacity limits of ten rounds are two of the gun controls most often pushed in the name of safety.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and a pro-staffer for Pulsar Night Vision. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and holds a Ph.D. in Military History, with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.