President Obama has voiced support for the Black Lives Matter movement for campaigning over the police treatment of African Americans. Speaking at a panel discussion in Washington, Obama said activists pointing to discrimination against African-American communities are raising a “legitimate issue.”

President Obama: “I think the reason that the organizers use the phrase 'Black Life Matters' was not because they were suggesting nobody else’s lives matter; rather, what they were suggesting was there is a specific problem that is happening in the African-American community that’s not happening in other communities. And that is a legitimate issue that we’ve got to address. We as a society, particularly given our history, have to take this seriously. And one of the ways of avoiding the politics of this and losing the moment is everybody just stepping back for a second and understanding that the African-American community is not just making this up, and it’s not just something being politicized, it’s real, and there’s a history behind it, and we have to take it seriously.”