President Obama will speak at a memorial service on Tuesday for the police officers killed in Dallas last week, his spokesman announced Sunday.
“At the invitation of Mayor Rawlings, the president will travel to Dallas, Texas, to deliver remarks at an interfaith memorial service at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said. “Further details about the president’s visit to Dallas will be available in the coming days.”
Obama was traveling for a NATO summit in Europe when the attack in Dallas took place, but he decided to shorten the trip by a day in light of the shooting. It was reported that he intended to visit Dallas, but the details of his plans weren’t known.
The president walked a fine line over the weekend as he spoke about the Dallas attack and the police shootings that gave rise to the protests where the ambush took place. “Americans of all races and all backgrounds are rightly outraged by the inexcusable attacks on police, whether it’s in Dallas or any place else,” Obama said at the opening of a press conference during the NATO summit in Warsaw, Poland. “That includes protesters, it includes family members who have grave concerns about police conduct — and they’ve said that this is unacceptable. There’s no division there.”
Obama also warned Black Lives Matter activists to be careful about their rhetoric. “In a movement like Black Lives Matter, there are always going to be folks who say things that are stupid or imprudent or over-generalized or harsh,” he said Saturday.
