MIAMI – James Shaw Jr., the man who grabbed the hot muzzle of an AR-15 and wrestled it away from a gunman at a Waffle House in Nashville, met Saturday with survivors of the Parkland, Fla., school shooting.
James Shaw Jr., waves to the crowd and legislators inside the Tennessee House chambers as he is honored for disarming a shooter inside a Nashville-area Waffle House at the Tennessee State House Tuesday April 24, 2018, in Nashville, Tenn. (Larry McCormack/The Tennessean via AP)“I met one of my heros [sic] today,” Shaw tweeted below his picture with Emma Gonzalez, a Stoneman Douglas High student, according to The Associated Press.
David Hogg tweeted his own selfie with Shaw, saying, “Wow just, wow JamesShawJr9 lots of work ahead but the young people will win.”
“Thank you great meeting you all, let’s keep inspiring and bringing ppl together,” Shaw responded.
The group was brought together by a shared bond as mass shooting survivors.
Seventeen people were killed in the Florida school shooting in February. The Waffle House shooting last month left four people dead and others wounded.
In a tweet, Shaw praised Gonzalez.
“Meeting the young adults of the Parkland incident [with] so much fire and inspiration in their eyes was a great joy.”
Also Saturday, Samantha Fuentes, one of the Parkland school shooting survivors who gave emotional speeches at the March for Our Lives in Washington, D.C., had something to celebrate: Three months after the attack, she says “My face is finally shrapnel free!”
Fuentes tweeted a photo of her face Saturday, showing a wide smile despite bruises and a hospital bandage stretching from her ear to her mouth.
“Regardless of the fact I look like I lost a fight, inside I’m winning in a way. I’ve been struggling so hard to love my face again, thank you for all your support,” she tweeted.
The speech Fuentes gave in Washington was memorable not only because she led the huge crowd in singing “Happy Birthday” for Nick Dworet, a classmate who was among the 17 people killed in the attack, and who would have turned 18 the day of the march. She also had to interrupt her speech to throw up behind the podium.
The Tennessean and The Associated Press contributed to this report.