And I am not and will not be afraid to keep fighting for commonsense reforms, and along withyou, achieve those on behalf of all who have been lost because of this senseless gun violencein our country.
But today, I stand before you because I know and you know there is a deeper challenge weface.
I had the great privilege of representing America around the world. I was so proud to shareour example, our diversity, our openness, our devotion to human rights and freedom. Thesequalities have drawn generations of immigrants to our shores, and they inspire people still. Ihave seen it with my own eyes.
And yet, bodies are once again being carried out of a Black church.
Once again, racist rhetoric has metastasized into racist violence.
Now, it's tempting, it is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident, tobelieve that in today's America, bigotry is largely behind us, that institutionalized racism nolonger exists.
But despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America's long struggle with race is far fromfinished.
I know this is a difficult topic to talk about. I know that so many of us hoped by electing ourfirst Black president, we had turned the page on this chapter in our history.
I know there are truths we don't like to say out loud or discuss with our children. But we haveto. That's the only way we can possibly move forward together.
Race remains a deep fault line in America. Millions of people of color still experience racism intheir everyday lives.
Here are some facts.
In America today, Blacks are nearly three times as likely as whites to be denied a mortgage.
In 2013, the median wealth of Black families was around $11,000. For white families, it wasmore than $134,000.
Nearly half of all Black families have lived in poor neighborhoods for at least two generations,compared to just 7 percent of white families.
African American men are far more likely to be stopped and searched by police, charged withcrimes, and sentenced to longer prison terms than White men, 10 percent longer for the samecrimes in the federal system.
In America today, our schools are more segregated than they were in the 1960s.
How can any of that be true? How can it be true that Black children are 500 percent more likelyto die from asthma than white kids? Five hundred percent!
More than a half century after Dr. King marched and Rosa Parks sat and John Lewis bled, afterthe Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act and so much else, how can any of these things betrue? But they are.
And our problem is not all kooks and Klansman. It's also in the cruel joke that goesunchallenged. It's in the off-hand comments about not wanting "those people" in theneighborhood.
Let's be honest: For a lot of well-meaning, open-minded white people, the sight of a youngBlack man in a hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear. And news reports about poverty and crimeand discrimination evoke sympathy, even empathy, but too rarely do they spur us to actionor prompt us to question our own assumptions and privilege.
We can't hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in America. We have toname them and own them and then change them.
You may have heard about a woman in North Carolina named Debbie Dills. She's the one whospotted Dylann Roof's car on the highway. She could have gone on about her business. Shecould have looked to her own safety. But that's not what she did. She called the police and thenshe followed that car for more than 30 miles.