TITLE CARD:  July 13, 2013 

NEWSCASTER:We are watching the trial of George Zimmerman very closely, waiting for a verdict─

NARRATOR:There was a verdict in the case of George Zimmerman, the man who shot and killed Trayvon Martin in what he claimed was self-defense.

JURY FOREMAN:In the circuit court of the 18th, we the jury find George Zimmerman not guilty─

PROTESTERS:Oh, no!

JURY FOREMAN:─so say we all, foreperson.

PROTESTER:Not guilty. Not guilty─

PROTESTER:Of what, everything?

PROTESTER:Everything.

PROTESTER:Are you [expletive deleted] kidding me?

PROTESTER:It’s crap! Like always. And that’s right, these men get away with it all the time~!

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON, Author, The Black Presidency:Obama initially, after George Zimmerman is found not guilty, releases a nearly cryptic press release that says, you know, “We’re a nation of laws. The jury has decided. We must abide by those laws.”

NARRATOR:The president watched as the protests grew.

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON:Stop. Are you serious? I mean, this is─ this is─ this is epic tides of grief washing across the collective soul of black America, the trauma that they are enduring.

MICHAEL SHEAR, The New York Times:The people inside the White House could see that he just desperately wanted to come out and say something.

NARRATOR:And he did, surprising the press corps.

MICHAEL SHEAR:When he finally came out that─ it was, like, a last minute thing.

Pres. BARACK OBAMA:The reason I actually wanted to come out today is not to take questions but to speak to an issue that obviously has gotten a lot of attention over the course of the last week, the issue of the Trayvon Martin─

WESLEY LOWERY, Author, They Can’t Kill Us All:He walks into the press room and begins essentially to riff on what his experience as a black man has been, and why in black America there is such a distrust, or lack of trust of the system, of the police, of these processes.

Pres. BARACK OBAMA:When Trayvon Martin was first shot, I said that this could have been my son. Another way of saying that is Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago.

JELANI COBB, The New Yorker:It is a very literal placement of himself in this person’s shoes in saying to African-Americans that this is an experience that he is familiar with.

Pres. BARACK OBAMA:There are very few African-American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me.

WESLEY LOWERY:That was actually a unique moment for the president. It’s him speaking to his own experience as a black American, something that no one can seize away from him.

Pres. BARACK OBAMA:There are very few African-American men who haven’t had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. That happens to me.

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON:He began to speak for black people for the first time in his administration. It was apparent that we had a friend, we being black people, in the White House.

TALK RADIO:Why must he go behind a microphone today and give a speech that’s intended to rile up─

TALK RADIO:Obama is grievance politics, and the primary reason for that grievance is race!

NARRATOR:But as before, his comments lit up the airwaves.

TALK RADIO:He fed into the victimization that the left has been peddling for decades to excuse─

NARRATOR:This time, Obama seemed to accept that he could not convince everyone.

TALK RADIO:This president doesn’t stand for anything that I stand for.

JELANI COBB, The New Yorker:He doesn’t have to worry about another potential election. He’s already kind of been stymied in his political agenda by, you know, intransigent Republicans. At this point, you know, speaking his mind is not going to make that any worse.