Robert Zimmerman, the brother of the man acquitted in the fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, reacted Friday to President Barack Obama’s impromptu statement on the case by saying that he would go a step beyond the president and advocate for defending youth “of all colors,” including African-Americans.
“The president talked about encouraging African-American youth but I would say also youth of all colors,” Zimmerman told Fox News by phone. “It might be in situations in their life that they don’t feel like they’re getting the encouragement from society that they need. That’s one of the things my brother was doing before this incident.”
In response to Obama’s call to train law enforcement to handle potential racial bias, Zimmerman added that for at-risk youth “sometimes the right encouragement and the right role models and sort of the right shoulder to lean on in very difficult times in life can prevent any kind of engagement with law enforcement or the criminal justice s system whatsoever.”
Zimmerman was measured in his response, praising Obama for speaking “off-the-cuff” and being “very sincere in his remarks.”
