• Congressman escorted from House after wearing hoodie in Trayvon Martin tribute

    Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill., pays tribute to Trayvon Martin - until he is escorted from the House floor due to rules prohibiting members from wearing hats and such.

    By NBC's Frank Thorp

     

    In a dramatic moment on the House floor this morning, Illinois Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL) was asked to leave the chamber after taking off his suit jacket and revealing that he was wearing a hoodie during a speech in tribute to Trayvon Martin. 

    Rush, who donned the hood and put on sunglasses in support of Martin, the Florida teenager who was gunned down last month in a racially-tinged incident, was escorted out of the House chamber after repeated requests by the presiding officer to leave. Wearing a hood or hat while the House is in session is against House rules.

    "Racial profiling has to stop Mr. Speaker," Rush said while taking off his suit jacket, "Just because someone wears a hoodie does not make them a hoodlum."

    George Zimmerman, a self-appointed neighborhood watch official, admitted to shooting Martin last month. Zimmerman's representatives have asserted he acted in self-defense, but the incident has become a racial touchstone due to allegations of racial profiling associated with the shooting, and the local police's handling of the investigation.

    The Congressional Black Caucus led the charge in calling for a federal investigation into the case; they were eventually joined in that demand by President Obama and a number of top Republicans.

    Rush continued his speech while the presiding officer, Rep. Gregg Harper (R-MS), repeatedly banged the gavel and told Rush to leave the chamber. When Rush failed to stop his speech, a representative from the Sergeant at Arms office approached Rush and walked out with the Congressman.

    Martin's parents were on Capitol Hill Tuesday to attend a briefing with Congressional Democrats to discuss hate crimes in America. The two testified briefly, thanking members of Congress for their support and calling for the arrest of Zimmerman.

    Watch the whole incident courtesy of House Television here.

  • Obama: 'If I had a son he'd look like Trayvon'

    President Obama addresses the Trayvon Martin case from a White House Rose Garden event.

    By NBC's Ali Weinberg

     

    President Obama today commented on the shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, saying he wanted to express his empathy to the youth’s parents.

    “My main message is to the parents of Trayvon Martin: if I had a son he'd look like Trayvon,” Obama said during a last-minute press conference arranged to announce his nomination for president of the World Bank, Dartmouth College president Jim Yong Kim.

    While he said he wanted to refrain from commenting on the ongoing investigation surrounding Martin’s shooting, allegedly by a neighbor on community watch in Sanford, Florida, Obama did say he thought the episode should spur “soul searching to figure out how something like this can happen.”

     “I think every parent in America should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this and that everybody pulls together, federal state and local to figure out exactly how this tragedy happened,” he said.

    Before he took the question about Martin from NBC’s Mike Viqueira, Obama praised his nominee for the World Bank position, noting his long resume in public health including a stint at the World Health Organization as the director of HIV/AIDs research in 2004, which Obama said would help inform his work at the World Bank.

    “The leader of the World Bank should have a deep understanding about the role development plays in the world,” Obama said.

    “I believe nobody is more qualified to carry out that mission than Dr. Jim Yong Kim.”

    While the United States has led the World Bank since the bank’s inception in World War II, Kim will still have to clear approval by the World Bank board of 187 member countries which will make a decision by the bank’s semi-annual meeting on April 21st.