President Obama In Philadelphia To Address 106th NAACP Convention
By Cherri Gregg
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) --- President Barack Obama will be in Philadelphia today to offer remarks at the 106th NAACP convention.
Obama touched the nation when he eulogized Reverend Clementa Pinckney last month, and now there are high hopes for his message as he speaks to the delegates of the NAACP convention.
"This gathering is of some of the most accomplished, most disciplined, most focused civil rights leaders in the country, and we are here to hear a serious message," says NAACP President Cornell Brooks.
Attendees are looking to Obama for national leadership on civil rights. And they'll be looking to former president Bill Clinton on Wednesday to discuss economics.
"We have high expectations that they're coming to this convention to make news," Brooks says.
"Over the past year, we've heard people ask the question-- are we in the middle of a movement," he says. "I want to say definitively, the movement has begun."
Brooks says he expects President Obama to provide guidance key civil rights issues facing communities of color, like racial profiling, mass incarceration, voting rights and hate crimes.
"He comes here in the aftermath of the tragedy in Charleston, understanding quite profoundly that we're looking to hear a leadership message at a leadership moment," Brooks says.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch is also expected to speak on Wednesday. "They all come to this place understanding we speak to the moment, it's not enough for us to be spectators," Brooks says. "We've got to speak to the moment, but more than that, we've got to act on it."
The 106th convention has included speeches by the nation's top legal minds, including Baltimore prosecutor Marilyn Mosby and Barbara Arnwine of the lawyers committee for civil rights.
