President Obama: Dallas Gunman Not Representative of Americans

President Barack Obama categorized the Dallas gunman who killed five officers this week as a "demented individual" whose self-professed hatred of police is not representative of Americans as a whole.

The president spoke from Warsaw, Poland, where he was attending a NATO summit. Obama spent much time addressing the Dallas tragedy — where a gunman this week killed five law enforcement officers and wounded seven more in what began as a peaceful protest against police brutality — in response to journalists' questions.

But he declined to speculate on what may have inspired the gunman to unleash his violence or categorize his actions as being sparked through some sort of ideological prism, when one reporter posed a question about motive.

"I think it's very hard to untangle the motives of this shooter," Obama said of the gunman, identified as former Army reservist Micah Xavier Johnson. Obama said he would leave theories about his motives to the psychologists.

Despite the near-daily headlines of black men being killed by police or attacks on police officers, Obama insisted the nation is still not as divided as it has been in the past. While acknowledging prevailing divisiveness, he evoked the times of social unrest in the turbulent 1960s — when riots erupted in the midst of civil rights battles while cities burned and protesters were killed — to contrast the past with today.

"When we start suggesting that somehow there's this enormous polarization, and we're back to the situation in the '60s, that's just not true," Obama said. "You're not seeing riots, and you're not seeing police going after people who are protesting peacefully. You've seen almost uniformly peaceful protests, and you've seen uniformly police handling those protests with professionalism.

"So as tough and hard and depressing as the loss of life was this week, we have a foundation to build on," the president assured. "We just have to have confidence that we can build on those better angels of our nature."

He rejected the notion of a divided America, even as incidents of violence with racial undertones command recent headlines.

"I firmly believe that America is not as divided as some have suggested," Obama said. "Americans of all races and all backgrounds are rightly outraged by the inexcusable attacks on police, whether it's in Dallas or anyplace else."

He noted that aversion to violence is shared by protesters. The rally that had taken place in Dallas this week before being torn asunder by violence had been a peaceful one — one of many such gatherings simultaneously staged across the country in response to the latest fatal shootings of black men at the hands of police.

Alton Sterling was killed by a policeman in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, while selling CDs outside a convenience store, and Philando Castile was shot dead by a police officer in Minnesota after the young man reached for his ID at the cop's directive.

"That includes protesters," Obama said of those rejecting violence. "It includes family members who have grave concerns about police conduct and they've said that this is unacceptable," Obama added. "There's no division there."

His remarks were the third time in as many days that the president has spoken about race-tinged events that have polarized the public, all in a span of a few days.

"This has been a tough week," Obama said with understatement. He's cutting short his European trip in order to visit Dallas to personally offer his support.

In terms of issues related to race, Obama cautioned against painting with too broad a brush when trying to assign motivations that may have prompted the Dallas shooter to kill police. The gunman's twisted mentality is not representative of all black Americans, just as the racist motives that led Dylan Roof to kill black parishioners in Charleston, South Carolina, in June of last year represent all white people.

"So we cannot let the actions of a few define us all," Obama said.

Amid the grief and mourning in the aftermath of tragedy, the president said he was inspired by the outpouring of "empathy and understanding" he had witnessed in Dallas and beyond as members of the public reiterate their support of their local police officers in the wake of the shooting in North Texas.

"That's the spirit that we all need to embrace," Obama said. "That's the spirit that I want to build on."

To that end, the president plans to convene a White House meeting next week to be attended by police officers, community leaders and civil rights advocates to discuss the next step that can be taken to repair divisiveness and distrust between police officers and some members of society.

Beyond dialogue, he vowed to continue to call for sensible gun control measures in the wake of the latest mass shooting in Dallas that came mere weeks after another gunman took 49 lives in an Orlando, Florida, nightclub.

"I am going to keep on talking about the fact that we cannot eliminate all racial tension in our country overnight," Obama said. "We are not going to be able to identify, ahead of time, and eliminate every madman or troubled individual who might want to do harm against innocent people. But we can make it harder for them to do so."

Image Screenshot via WH.gov