Here Comes Obama's Statement On The Ferguson Protests And Iraq...
Obama's statement comes amid more than a week of unrest in Ferguson, the St. Louis suburb where protests and riots have raged in the wake of the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown by a Ferguson police officer. Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon (D) lifted a midnight curfew that had been imposed for two nights amid increasing violence.
Obama last addressed the situation in Ferguson last Thursday in a statement from Martha's Vineyard, where he and his family have been vacationing. He is back in Washington for two days for what the White House says is meetings with advisers before heading back to Martha's Vineyard for the rest of the week.
Obama met with Attorney General Eric Holder at the White House on Monday to discuss the situation. Holder has ordered a federal autopsy to be performed on
Meanwhile, this will be Obama's sixth statement on the situation in Iraq over the past 12 days, as the U.S. has over that span begun a campaign of airstrikes aimed at aiding Iraqi forces in their fight against radical Islamic militants from the group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or ISIL).
The Pentagon said that it had conducted 15 airstrikes Monday near the Mosul Dam, the country's largest dam that provides electricity and water to a large portion of the country. The U.S.'s airstrike campaign has helped Iraqi and Kurdish forces to wrest back control of the dam from ISIS fighters. Since Aug. 8, the Pentagon said, the U.S. has conducted 68 airstrikes in Iraq - 35 of them coming near the Mosul Dam.
This post will be updated when Obama speaks.