On Wednesday night Highlands Ranch High School students and parents walked out of a vigil (meant to honor victims and heroes of the shooting) after gun control activists politicized the event.

Only ABC’s Good Morning America, on Thursday, covered the outrage over politicians (like Democratic Senator and presidential candidate Michael Bennet) hijacking the memorial.

While CBS This Morning and NBC’s Today show offered stories on the Highlands Ranch school shooting, they both ignored gun control advocacy by politicians as the reason students and parents walked out of the vigil.

One student (seen in the following May 8 report from NBC's Denver affiliate KUSA9) criticized the blatant political exploitation:

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT IN YELLOW SHIRT: What has happened at STEM is awful. But it’s not a statistic. We can’t be used as a reason for gun control. We are a people, not a statement!

NBC correspondent Ron Mott, on Thursday's Today show, featured a soundbite from that same student (in the yellow shirt) but did not include the portion of his statement that was critical of the politicians – even though it was readily available from his own network’s Denver affiliate.

NBC

Today

May 9, 2019 RON MOTT: Last night at an emotional vigil for a wounded community, some grieving students expressing anger, frustration, and sadness. But also honoring the bravery of Kendrick Castillo. UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT: We wanted to say really quick, we love you, Kendrick. We will remember you ever and always.

Only ABC national correspondent Matt Gutman, on Thursday’s Good Morning America, reported on the anger from students and parents over the anti-gun rights politicians overtaking the event:

MATT GUTMAN: Good morning, George. It was pretty shocking to see those hundreds of students and parents marching out of that gymnasium protesting what they called the politicization of their grief. They said they didn’t want to talk about gun control. They wanted to talk about the heroes who stopped that shooting. At the vigil for that school shooting’s victims the survivors rising up. Politicians like Democratic presidential hopeful Senator Michael Bennet spoke but it was the students who demanded to be heard. Stalking out of the gymnasium. They demanded that the vigil instead focus on the shooting’s victims including 18 year-old Kendrick Castillo.”

The following are the relevant transcripts from the May 9 editions of ABC’s Good Morning America, CBS This Morning and NBC’s Today show: