WASHINGTON (AP) President Barack Obama says the mistrust of law enforcement that was exposed after the fatal police shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, has a corrosive effect on all of America, not just on black communities, and it flows from significant racial disparities in the administration of justice.
Speaking Saturday night at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation's annual awards dinner, Obama said these suspicions harm communities that need law enforcement the most. "It makes folks who are victimized by crime and need strong policing reluctant to go to the police because they may not trust them," he said. "And the worst part of it is, it scars the hearts of our children."
The fatal shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in August sparked days of violent protests and racial unrest in predominantly black Ferguson. Brown was black and unarmed. The police officer who shot him was white. Obama addressed the matter carefully but firmly, saying the young man's death and the anger that followed reawakened the country to the fact that in many communities, "a gulf of mistrust" exists between local residents and law enforcement.
"Too many young men of color feel targeted by law enforcement guilty of walking while black, driving while black, judged by stereotypes that fuel fear and resentment and hopelessness," he said.
Obama announced the expansion of My Brother's Keeper, a community-based program launched this year to help make young minority men's lives better. He said government cannot play the primary role in the lives of children but it "can bring folks together" to make a difference for the young.
