A 17-year-old high Texas school student is looking to make a dent in local politics and has announced he’s running for the Houston City Council.
Marcel McClinton told Fox 26 Houston he will launch his campaign for council at-large later this month at Stratford High School, and he hopes to unseat current council member Michael Kubosh.
“I have so much love for my city, and I want to make change now and tomorrow,” he told the station. “I love the activism side of politics.”
McClinton, a gun reform activist, survived a shooting in 2016 when he was teaching at a Sunday School. One person died and others were injured, per Fox 26.
“It was a terrible experience,” said McClinton. “We had to hide the kids and shelter them, then I sat for an hour as he shot off rounds.”
The high school senior helped co-organize the Houston March For Our Lives, described as the “sister march of the national movement,” which was “organized by survivors of the Parkland high school shooting.”
“I love the activism side of politics,” McClinton said. “I love being able to connect with someone and amplify their story.”
Check out McClinton’s story below.
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Teddy is a multimedia journalist who serves as the culture and political writer for EBONY. His work has appeared in NBC's Owned and Operated stations, as well as DNAInfo, which covered local neighborhood news in New York City. He received his Masters in Journalism from the Craig Newmark School of Journalism at CUNY in 2017.