In the week since 17 of David Hogg's classmates and teachers were gunned down in Florida, he and his fellow high schoolers have launched a movement that reshaped the gun control debate almost overnight and may influence the US midterm elections.
Staring boldly into TV cameras, Mr Hogg and other students who survived the February 14 Parkland school massacre have demanded lawmakers restrict gun sales and are targeting politicians funded by the pro-gun National Rifle Association lobby.
They have taken to social media to urge peers to hold a National School Walkout on March 14 and converge on Washington 10 days later for the March For Our Lives.
Plunging into a debate that has long polarised the US between those defending gun ownership as a constitutional right and those demanding measures to stop mass shootings, the students are now focusing on the November elections.
"We get out there and make sure everybody knows how much money their politician took from the NRA," Mr Hogg said.
They want to influence not only those casting their first ballot this year, but all voters, to make choices along gun-rights lines.
The students seem to have made more progress in a few days than years of anti-gun advocacy that has stumbled on opposition from congressional Republicans who fiercely defend their constitutional right to own guns.
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The students' movement is forcing donors to cut funding to the NRA and pressuring lawmakers to stop taking money from the politically influential gun rights group.
The teenage activists themselves are collecting millions of dollars from celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey and George Clooney, enjoy pro bono advertising from people in Hollywood and organisational know-how from groups including the Women's March.
Brandon Wolf, a survivor of the 2016 mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, praised the Parkland students for bringing an end to years of inaction.
"These teenagers have done the impossible," said Mr Wolf, a member of the Florida Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence. "And all it took was a group of angry children with the right message to slap some sense into somebody."
What may be different about the Parkland students is their almost instantaneous mobilisation and the power of social media, where their passionate speeches have gone viral, experts said.
"It's this perfect storm of young people whose authority to speak cannot be denied because their friends were just murdered, have control of social media, the ability to speak to mass media, have celebrity support and organisational infrastructure," said Sasha Costanza-Chock, an associate professor of civic media at MIT.
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Democrats have rushed to support the teenagers, hoping the movement can help them in the midterm elections by boosting historically low turnout among young Democratic voters.
Republicans, on the other hand, warned that it was unclear whether the students would gain momentum beyond Florida, where they pushed Republican Governor Rick Scott to propose tighter gun laws on Friday.
In recent days, NRA officials have lashed out at gun control advocates, arguing that Democratic elites are politicising the Parkland rampage to erode gun rights.
To gun rights groups, Mr Hogg and his friends are being used by gun-control organisations to seek the same gun ban proposals that failed after mass shootings including the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.
The students themselves say they do not need anyone's approval and refuse to align with any political party, pointing out that both Republicans and Democrats take NRA money.
"Honestly both sides are pretty corrupt and I'm not willing to take a side unless I know the person," said Mr Hogg. "These politicians need to be afraid."
Reuters
