President Obama Speaks At Dallas Memorial: Our Nation’s Deepest Fault Lines Have Widened [VIDEO]

Politico reports:

Paying tribute Tuesday to the five police officers slain in the line of duty last week in Dallas, President Barack Obama called upon the United States to reject despair after a tumultuous week.

“All of it left us wounded and angry. And hurt. The deepest fault lines of our democracy have suddenly been exposed, perhaps even widened,” Obama said at an interfaith service in Dallas, joined by several members of Congress, Vice President Joe Biden and his immediate predecessor, George W. Bush.

The divisions within the country “are not new” and while “they have surely been worse, in even the recent past, that offers us little comfort,” Obama said. “Faced with this violence, we wonder if the divides of race in America can ever be bridged. We wonder if an African-American community that feels unfairly targeted by police and a police department that is feel unfairly maligned for doing their jobs can ever understand each other’s experience.”

“Today, in this audience, I see people who have protested on behalf of criminal justice reform grieving along police officers. I see people who mourn from the five officers we lost, but also weep for the families of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. In this audience, I see what’s possible,” Obama said. “I see what’s possible when we recognize that we are one American family, all deserving of equal treatment. All deserving equal respect. All children of God. That’s the America I know.”