President Obama believes the US is less racially divided despite protests
The deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. sparked nationwide fury and backlash when the white officers in both cases were not criminally charged. But despite the backlash President Obama says the United States is less racially divided than many would think.
The deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. sparked nationwide fury when the white officers in both cases were not criminally charged. But despite the backlash President Obama says the United States is less racially divided than many would think.
“I actually think that it’s probably in its day-to-day interactions less racially divided,” Obama recently told National Public Radio. But a Bloomberg Politics survey out this month found that 53% of Americans feel interactions between white and black communities have deteriorated since he took office six years ago.
The major sticking point at the moment continues to be opinions around police brutality cases; with the majority of white Americans agreed with the decision not to charge Ferguson Officer Darren Wilson in Brown’s death, while nearly all blacks disagreed.
Obama remains undeterred and has sought to channel people’s frustration into a national campaign for better police relations. He’s also expressed optimism that the New Year will usher in cooperation in Congress under GOP control. “Now you’ve got Republicans in a position where it’s not enough for them simply to grind the wheels of Congress to a halt and then blame me.”
During the conversation with NPR News, the president insisted that low morale around race relations in the U.S. is exaggerated by the national conversation around recent violence and not an accurate reflection of the state of affairs around the country.
Grio fam, do you agree?
