Rep. Peter King on Monday jabbed at President Obama’s rhetoric on race.
“The president says we have to have a conversation on race, and then he says its up to the police to change their tactics and their methods, implying that the police are the ones that are always wrong,” the Republican congressman from New York said on Fox News Monday.
Statements from Obama and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio after a grand jury declined to indict a police officer who put Eric Garner in a chokehold added to the tensions, eventually contributing to the murder of two NYPD officers over the weekend, King said.
“Whatever was right or wrong about Staten Island, it was wrong of the mayor and the president to imply that somehow this involves race, that it was part of some endemic racism in the police department or in our society,” he added.
Two New York City Police Department officers were shot and killed Saturday in an execution style attack that has been dubbed as revenge for the non-indictment of the NYPD officer. The shooter, who killed himself after killing the officers, had posted numerous anti-police social media posts prior to his attack.
“The climate that the mayor is creating, it’s not intentional on his apart, but the reality is that it’s there and this climate is attracting the mad men in society and also giving a legitimacy to these violent protesters,” he said. “Police have done more to save minority lives than anyone in this country.”
