An Obama moment

During the town hall, Ho-Shing invoked the names of Hogg, Kasky and Gonzalez, saying they need to take part in gun-violence discussions in locations in South Florida where it is happening. She doesn’t see much of the #NeverAgain students at school, but plans to make sure they are aware of Gunder’s upcoming town hall in Broward County.

“I have no doubt their hearts are in the right place, and I love them, and I’m so proud of them and the inclusivity that they’re showing nationally, but I feel like with the importance of going to Boston, Chicago and all those places, there’s also an importance in being home,” she said. “I understand there is, like, a bigger picture, but this is your neighborhood. This is where you were raised, Broward County, and right next door, Miami-Dade.”

Ho-Shing has begun getting invitations for her own travels, including a recent address at Chicago’s Thornwood High School — notable, she says, because the students there assumed she’d be white — and at an April conference on electoral politics at the Latino Leadership Institute in New York.

She and friend Roberts recently were panelists at the United State of Women Summit in Los Angeles, where they spent a few moments backstage huddled with the event’s keynote speaker, former first lady Michelle Obama.

Just before Obama went onstage, she met with HoShing, Roberts and Chicago teen Journey Jamison.

“Oh, my gosh, she smells like heaven,” Ho-Shing says, laughing. “She held us by our hands and she called us by our names. It was like she was honored to meet us and we’re, like, in tears. … She said that our words are just powerful, she agrees with us, and that we need to continue to keep fighting. People are going to push us down. People are going to say nasty things about us. But when they do that, it just means we’re doing the right thing. She said, ‘You guys are going to do great things. Just keep pushing.’ ”