we will speak with ben jealous about the case in the first post all comments of the juror a trayvon martin's friend rachel jeantel. then we go to egypt or seven people died and over 260 were winded last night between clashes -- were wounded last night in clashes. >> we do not kneel for anyone and we do not respond to pressure from anyone. of course the rule of the people is more important in any visit or representative and more important in any state or it of course i reject the visit of the american representative because they are the reason for the military to. >> we will speak with democracy kouddous inf abdel cairo. all of that and more coming up. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. crow tests against the acquittal of george zimmerman in the shooting death of unarmed african-american teenager trayvon martin continued across the country monday. in los angeles, at least 13 people were arrested overnight as police accused some protesters vandalizing cars, breaking windows, and setting fires. the los angeles police first declared a tactical al

that's from ben jealous. president of the naacp. i can also tell you, i am pleased to report that at this point, no reports of any sort of civil unrest. no reports of violence. everything here is peaceful. everything around these parts as well has been peaceful by and large. >> thank you very much. to follow up on that statement by naacp president ben jealous, we also got a statement from the chairman, who said among other things, this case has been reenergized the movement and racial profiling in the united states. how do you funnel that energy? >> i'm moments from a conference call. >> don't forget, there was a they found rodney king innocent, federal court civil rights charges were next that's where they were found guilty. we've been at these junctures before. i'm saying what don west said. justice department investigating on civil rights has nothing to do with this. i think you can energize there and we will nams national action network, my group and others, will deal with the stand your ground law. the underlying law was the sa

we heard from ben jealous. any indication which way they might go on this? >> well, we do know that the justice department is responding today and they say that right now what they're doing is looking at all of the evidence. the evidence that they've collected, also the fbi, also the evidence that came out in the state trial, as well. so, they haven't made any determination but we do know that they know that this call for filing a federal charges is out there. they do know that they have had an open case as far as the zimmerman trial. they had it open looking at possible charges for quite sometime now. now, we just wait and see which way the justice department will go. don? >> all right. renee marsh, thank you very much. we appreciate that. >>> we have been talking about protests happening in florida and -- not just in florida. acquittal of george zimmerman sparked rallies and protests all across the country. >> not one more. not one more. not one more. >> that was the scene in chicago. demonstrators taking the street shouting. many held pictures of tray skr

do you have the same amount of confidence that ben jealous has that hate was a factor here?o, i don't. one of the biggest reasons why george zimmerman found trayvon martin to be suspicious because at some other point there was a black guy in that neighborhood who supposedly broke into someone's house. we can establish pretty clearly race was a factor initially in getting on zimmerman's radar. it's really hard to say legally speaking that it was a hate crime, and that hate crime really was the actual shooting of trayvon martin. so i understand the optimism from ben jealous and others, but i don't see it as very likely. >> michael: it's also a difficult thing for him to defend, for zimmerman to defend. everything is ambiguous. it's almost word versus word. do you think the doj should go forward in this criminal case against zimmerman? >> i don't think that they should if they're doing it simply to send some kind of a message because we already have too many mixed messages being interpreted from this. we have conservatives, we even have george zimmerman's brother minutes after

. >> i want to bring benefit jealojel -- ben jealous the president of naacp. he joins from the naacp convention in orlando and joining our conversation is marc morial of the urban league. ben, i want to start out of the ghert with your reaction when you heard the juror speak about her reasons for finding george zimmerman not guilty. did you find the fact that with what she was saying was supported by the way that the defense presented their case? >> you know, i think what you hear there is sort of cause for concern, that perhaps these jurors, for some reason, had a hard time really putting themselves in trayvon's shoes and his family's shoes. i don't think it's really helpful at this point to really, you know, dig into the jury too much or into the -- do the postgame quarterbacking. what is important now is that folks focus on what we can do going forward and going forward, yes, his family has more options in the courts of this state from a civil perspective and, most importantly, the usdoj can actually bring criminal charges here too and that is what we are ca

naacp president ben jealous told candy crowley today he's been in touch with officials at the justice department. let's listen to that. >> they will make a choice about whether or not they will pursue criminal civil rights charges. we are calling on them to do just that because when you look at his comments and when you look at comments made by young black men who lived in that neighborhood about how they felt, especially targeted by him, there is reason to be concerned that race was a factor. >> now, reason to be concerned versus making a case. two very different standards. important to note, prosecutors had available to them a law on the florida books that is an aggravating crime for picking someone because of among other things race. they chose not to charge george zimmerman with that. we'll talk to candy crowley more about that this hour. >> many leaders called for calm after the verdict. you can imagine in churches across the country ministers, preachers, all of them will be talking about what came out of the trayvon martin case. alina machado is in florida looking at just this.

and we're getting this from the naacp president ben jealous. ben jealous has information, presumably from african-americans who have been in that neighborhood, who say in his words, who have been targeted by zimmerman. race may have been a factor. may have been involved in this particular case. so jealous said that he's reached out to eric holder, reached out to the department of justice and officials on that team to see if indeed they could move forward with more legal action. but again, you'll have to remember, mark o'mara made this point very clear. when it comes to self-defense in the state of florida, and that statute, there's a line about stand your ground that basically gives a person immunity. if you act in self-defense, you can have immunity from criminal, from civil prosecution. and o'mara made the quote, he said, we will seek and we will get immunity. he said that in the press conference following this verdict. >> and the attorney general himself, eric holder, who is getting ready to speak out on this zimmerman trial on the not guilt

. >> reporter: naacp president ben jealous, whose organization's website was flooded with petitioners urging federal intervention, said the zimmerman case marks a call to action. >> we are continuing to do what we have always done, to keep faith in our justice system. but part of keeping the faith in our justice system is being able to access the full extent of our justice system and that's what the people of this country are crying for. >> reporter: sunday, president obama weighed in writing "i know this case has elicited strong passions. and in the wake of the verdict, i know those passions may be running even higher, but we are a nation of laws and a jury has spoken." this afternoon, attorney general eric holder promised to keep looking into martin's killing. >> the justice department shares your concerns. i share your concerns. >> reporter: tonight, george zimmerman is said to be in hiding, according to attorney mark o'mara. meantime, as for trayvon martin's parents, other than a tweet or two since the verdict, they've been largely out of view. brian? >> ron mott starting us off a

naacp ben jealous told candy crowley he's been in touch with officials at the justice department. >> they will make a choice about whether or not they will pursue criminal civil rights charges. we're calling on them to do just that because when you look at his comments and when you look at comments made by young black men who lived in that neighborhood about how they felt especially targeted by him, there is reason to be concerned that race was a factor. >> defense attorney mark o'mara of course had a very different take on this. he saw his client george zimmerman as a victim of the media. i want you to listen to what mr. o'mara described last night. >> you guys, the media, he was like a patient in an operating table where a mad scientist were permitting experiments on him and he had no anesthesia. he didn't know why he was turned into this monster, but quite honestly, you guys had lot to do with it because you took a story that was fed to you and you ran with it and you ran right over him. and that was horrid to him. >> okay. so i'm joined now by our legal analysts sunny hostin, for

hurt by the good guys who mistamis t mistake them because of their color. >> thank you so much, ben jealousime. we'll talk to you down the road. up next, van jones and newt gingrich, cnn new cross fire hosts, have very different takes on the verdict and how race figured in. you really couldn't have come at a better time. these chevys are moving fast. i'll take that malibu. yeah excuse me, the equinox in atlantis blue is mine! i was here first, it's mine. i called about that one, it's mine. mine! mine. it's mine. it's mine. mine. mine. mine. mine. it's mine! no it's not, it's mine! better get going, it's chevy model year-end event. [ male announcer ] the chevy model year-end event. the 13s are going fast, time to get yours. right now, get this great lease on a 2013 chevy cruse ls for around $149 a month. does your dog food have? 18 percent? 20? new purina one true instinct has 30. active dogs crave nutrient-dense food. so we made purina one true instinct. learn more at purinaone.com >> he's not the racist you thought he was. my fear, now that they connected that conversation to his convictio

joining me right now is the president and the ceo of the naacp, ben jealous.here. let's start out of the gate with this because a lot of people will be curious as to how you want to pursue these charges with the department of justice against george zimmerman. what's the first step? and do you think you can actually be successful in getting traction in that effort? >> well, the most important message right now we want folks to understand, this is not over. there may be a civil case. yes, the doj could bring civil -- excuse me, criminal charges. we are pushing them to do just that. they tell us they continue to look at this case. this case is open. i think it is almost certain that if a civil case is brought, they would wait until that is done to see what comes out of that. if there is a civil case, it's almost impossible mr. zimmerman would not have to take the stand. and what he says could be critical to a future case. so, right now what people can do is go to naacp.org and actually sign onto the petition. more than a quarter million people have done so. the s

i talked to ben jealous a short time ago. he said the speech is hands down the most anticipated speech of the convention. he told me he's going to caulk about the verdict and moving forward and the justice department's role moving forward. but he's also going to be talking about the voting rights act. he's also going to be talking about what black voters specifically need to be doing in the wake of the voting rights act. in addition to eric holder peg today, also kathleen sebelius, health and human services secretary, the implementation of obama care. sean donovan, hud secretary talking about predatory lending. again, as you indicated, the not guilty verdict is top of mind for all convention attendees. i was talking to folks in the hotel last night. that was all they wanted to talk about. not just the verdict itself but what happens now. so i'll toss it back to you for now. >> lets talk about what could happen now. pete williams. pete, for those of us not well versed how this proceeds legally at the federal level, give the au

we're going to talk about ceo ben jealous.versation in general, if it needs to be had, we'll have it it. >> the conversation starts, just don't end the conversation, do something is what a lot of people are saying. chris will talk to ben about that. >>> we're also learning more about what killed "glee" actor cory monteith, we're learning that it was clearly a fatal mixture of alcohol and heroin. he was so young. and he just left rehab. how does someone relapse so quickly? or did he leave rehab too early, we're going to talk to dr. sanjay gupta about that difficult process. >> and to just help to feed the paranoia about the man, we're going to talk about the nsa, oh, this is terrible, they're spying on us. what about stories like in order tr nordstrom and benetton tracking you, yes. >> i always assume there's a camera somewhere these days. >> the cameras, when you walk in the store, it's amazing how the retail move knows every one of your moves and what makes you pull the trigger on a purchase. >> don lemon, is it true that you

. >> this just one day after naacp president ben jealous made clear that the trayvon martin case is the painful lens through which the next generation of civil rights movement will be witnessed. >> we got the right to live in any gated community, but we lost the right to know that the self-appointed community watch volunteer would protect our kid and not kill them. we will make this country safer for all of our children. we will roll back stand your ground laws. we will pass powerful anti-racial profiling ordinance. >> martin family attorney benjamin crump put it, the message coming out of the trial should be alarming to everybody. >> the united states supreme court has said that the police cannot profile people, so are we not going to let ordinary citizens profile our children? this could be anybody's child. >> meanwhile, in the state's capital, tallahassee, approved a student activist called the dream defenders occupied the rotunda and staged a sit-in in the office of governor rick scott. the protesters want the governor to call a special session of the state legislature to address fl

naacp leader ben jealous is among those calling for the justice department to file civil rights chargesrman. >> we have almost 1 million signatures from people across this country calling on the u.s. department of justice to bring criminal charges, criminal civil rights charges, and they need to do that. some people say it's a high bar. it's a bar that can be met. >> msnbc's craig melvin covered the zimmerman trial from start to finish. he joins us live from the convention from the naacp in orlando. craig, as i understand it, almost 1 million people have signed this petition. >> yeah, close to a million have signed online. they expect that number to climb. here in orlando, the convention hall starting to fill up. attorney general eric holder expected to speak at 4:00. he'll of course be talking about that verdict that came down. we also expect him to spend some time talking about voting rights as well. you probably recognize this man. this is reverend william barber. he's the state conference president of the north carolina state naacp. first of all, let's start with the verdict. how ha

. >> obviously, there are a lot of americans who agree with ben jealous. a lot who do not. either way, a civil rights lawsuit is a possibility. as randi kaye explains, a lot of hurdles are in the way. >> the justice department had opened an investigation into trayvon martin's death last year, but they allowed florida's criminal case to proceed. once again, the pressure is on justice. as attorney general eric holder said last year, the bar is high. >> for a federal hate crime, we have to prove the highest standard in the law, something that was reckless, that was negligent, does not meet that standard. we have to show there was specific intent to do the crime with the requisite state of mind. >> neither prosecutors or the defense made race the central issue in the state's case against george zimmerman. but civil rights leaders call the killing of trayvon martin a hate crime. they say zimmerman racially profiled martin, something zimmerman and his family have denied. >> you look at a jury without a black and without a man on it, if it was a jury of trayvon's peers, the depart

i talked to ben jealous this morning, president of the naacp. he's optimistic that petition much like the online petition which led they think to the prosecution of george zimmerman, they think that this petition could very well have the same result. this afternoon the attorney general eric holder set to address the convention at 4:00. he will of course be talking about the verdict, just as he did in d.c. on sunday at the delta sigma theta, 100th anniversary. but he's also expected to talk about the voting rights decision. he is expected to talk about predator lending as well. but to say that he is the most anticipated speaker of the naacp's convention would be a gross understatement. >> indeed. craig melvin, thank you so much. thank you and ron mott for your extraordinary coverage throughout. this has been a very tough issue and i know it has been hard on both of you. thanks for helping us out. >>> the lapd is promising what it calls a strict posture toward any continuing protests out there today. bril bratt bill bratton is the former police co

. >> ben jealous from the naacp today and other civil rights group as well pressing the justice departmento press civil rights charges against george zimmerman. joining me now, president of the naacp's legal defense and educational fund. great to see you you. are you a law professor. you know civil rights law better than anyone that i know. we were just talking to paul butler, professor at georgetown, about the fact that he doesn't think that the law is actually written for george zimmerman. that is may not work and that eric holder is obviously on the spop. what if the justice department does not pursue charges? >> i think the important thing is that they do the investigation. it's absolutely true that most of the civil rights statutes that might cover a situation like this tend to be focused on law enforcement, what we call state actors, people operating under color of state law or people engaged in a conspiracy, two people depriving someone of their civil rights. a hate crime law only requires body injury because of the victim's race, color or national origin. of course it is the "becau

ben jealous. president and ceo of the naacp. thank you for your time. >> thank you candy. >> up next, more reaction to the zimmerman verdict from a member of the congressional black caucus and hispanic caucus. they're with us and they talked with president obama just days ago about gun violence and much more. and walmart's super summer savings event is here. this 5-piece dining set on clearance, save over $49! how bout all these bikes on rollback? like this mongoose adult bike, you save over $20! get more summer for your money at walmart's super summer savings event. your skin can grow more beautiful every time you wear it. neutrogena® healthy skin liquid makeup. 98% of women saw improvement in their skin. neutrogena® cosmetics. ♪ [ male announcer ] the parking lot helps by letting us know who's coming. the carts keep everyone on the right track. the power tools introduce themselves. all the bits and bulbs keep themselves stocked. and the doors even handle the checkout so we can work on that thing that's stuck in the thing. [ fe

ben jealous, we're going to leave it there. thank you so much.ntioned, we are keeping an eye on that jury for you. we've got three brave women who speak out about, on their own terms in the play coming up next. when you experience something great, you want to share it. with everyone. that's why more customers recommend verizon, america's largest 4g lte network. all this produce from walmart and secretly served it up in the heart of peach country. it's a fresh-over. we want you to eat some peaches and tell us what you think. they're really juicy. it must have just come from the farm. this right here is ideal for me. walmart works directly with growers to get you the best quality produce they've ever had. what would you do if i told you all this produce is from walmart? wow! is it really? (laughter) find fresh peaches and all your quality produce. backed by our 100% money back guarantee. walmart. [ herbie ] eh, hold on brent, what's this? mmmm, nice car. there's no doubt, that's definitely gonna throw him off. she's seen it too. oh this could be tr

. >>> plus, i'm going to be joined by the naacp's ben jealous and marc morial.eral government likely to bring federal hate crimes charges and how might that impact any civil trial that the family might bring against george zimmerman. rand paul and ted cruz join the fight on salts and not on the side you may think. why they want assault cases out of the chain of command. wi drive a ford fusion. who is healthier, you or your car? i would say my car. probably the car. cause as you get older you start breaking down. i love my car. i want to take care of it. i have a bad wheel - i must say. my car is running quite well. keep your car healthy with the works. $29.95 or less after $10 mail-in rebate at your participating ford dealer. so you gotta take care of yourself? yes you do. you gotta take care of your baby? oh yeah! then you'll love lactose-free lactaid® it's 100% real milk that's easy to digest so you can fully enjoy the dairy you love. lactaid®. for 25 years, easy to digest. easy to love. good morning. i'm thomas roberts. >>> a fascinating new look into how the

[laughter] [applause] ended upt know how i sharing a microphone with ben jealous. inause we have had a change our panel, we're going to make that the questions a little bit. i'm going to keep you all on your toes. we want to get to the issues of the way money and politics, voting rights and senate rules are interlinked. we have got people, karen and ben are going to talk about the state level, the new york experience, and we are all really excited about what you are doing in north carolina. we're are going to leave it to fill and larry to look more at the national political picture and give us a picture of what is diy's to accomplish. -- what di wants to jobless. we've got a lot of people here who back what you are doing and want to be as helpful as possible to you. tell us exactly what is going on in your discussion, and what we might hope to see happen in july. if anything. >> right now, the senate is immersed in the immigration debate. we're looking forward to passing that bill out of the senate, keeping it intact with the framework that was put together foure g

one statement from the naacp president ben jealous -- you know him well, of course.e it up there on the screen. he says, "we are outraged and heartbroken over today's verdict." he also says "we will pursue civil rights charges with the department of justice. we will continue to fight for the removal of stand your ground rules in every state and we will not rest until racial profiling in all its forms is outlawed." and as ben jealous says right there, they're asking the department of justice to look into civil rights violations here against george zimmerman. do you support that effort? >> absolutely. rainbow push is having a 10:00 press conference here in chicago. they're making the same appeal. the two unifying factors of civil rights, one is the supreme court unifying our struggle by attacking voter rights enforcement last wednesday and now the case of trayvonmartin, who joins a legacy of emmitt hill and the innocent man shot down without a sense of justice as a response. i will tell you that we all are stunned. we deserve better. people of good will and conscience

participants include naacp president ben jealous, the greenpeace executive director bill radford, andregon senator jeff merkley. that begins at noon eastern on c-span. >> next, a discussion about the future of the republican party and then some of the challenges women face in political campaigns and in office. after that, a chance to find out how recent campaigns were affected by candidate statements caught on tape. needs a strong partner, and honest partner more than the american president, in whatd and cocooned harry truman called "the great white prison." that is what i concluded after five years and hundreds of interviews through those presidents with raid spouses who were willing to speak hard truths, those presidents have a distinct advantage. let me give you an example. had pat nixon been able to cut through her husband's paranoia, watergate might have been avoided. but she had long since given up on that i the time they reach the white house. they were living virtually separate lives as you will see in my per trail of this saddest of all presidential couples. "i do not give my

[laughter] [applause] >> i don't know how i ended up sharing a microphone with ben jealous. because we have had a change in our panel, we're going to make that the questions a little bit. i'm going to keep you all on your toes. we want to get to the issues of the way money and politics, voting rights and senate rules are interlinked. we have got people, karen and ben are going to talk about the state level, the new york experience, and we are all really excited about what you are doing in north carolina. we're are going to leave it to phil and larry to look more at the national political picture and give us a picture of what di wants to jobless. we've got a lot of people here who back what you are doing and want to be as helpful as possible to you. tell us exactly what is going on in your discussion, and what we might hope to see happen in july. if anything. >> right now, the senate is immersed in the immigration debate. we're looking forward to passing that bill out of the senate, keeping it intact with the framework that was put together by the group of eight, four democra

keep in mind the naacp and its president, ben jealous, they believe that race may have been a factorbelieve the department of justice should look into it. now, we're also hearing from trayvon martin's parents. keep in mind we heard sybrina fulton over twitter basically calling this her darkest hour. we heard from tracy martin over twitter saying that he will always love his baby tray. and we're also hearing from their attorney, benjamin crump, who expressed what this family is going through after the verdict. i want you to listen. >> they went through the grieving process. they cried, they prayed, they went to church sunday morning. and when sybrina fulton came home from church, she said, attorney crump, this verdict will not define trayvon. we will define trayvon. and i was so inspired by her. they've been so dignified and graceful throughout this, you know, just terrible situation that has been laid upon their doorstep. >> so when you talk about self-defense, that statute here in the state of florida, there is a line, that word that we've all referred to, the stand your ground clau

. >> stephanie: i saw ben jealous on tv, and he said there is a lot more evidence that never made itew george zimmerman talking about his racism. >> you would think that would have been relevant. >> stephanie: right. >> but no, it is not about race. >> stephanie: right. and i believe he said other black kids in the area that was talking about feeling targeted by him and yadda yadda. this was not a complete mishap. chris wrote a great piece, the former oj prosecutor, he said there may be justice yet for trayvon, and quotes melissa perry who i think has been great on this. that's the one thing we heard on the phones a lot yesterday there is a different reality for black and white parents. black parents instinctively understand about this stuff. somebody wrote a piece about the black code just what black young men instinctively know in terms of how they should behave -- >> and the clothing that black parents have to tell their children to wear -- >> stephanie: right. the struggles continues, our work is not ever. darden writes, i agree, work on a national level to further the debate ove

[laughter] [applause] >> i don't know how i wound up sharing a microphone with ben jealous. i don't know. [laughter] because we've had a change in our panel, we're going to mix up the questions a little bit. i'm going to keep you all on your toes. we want to get to the issues of the way money in politics, voting rights and senate rules are interlinked, and we've got people, karen and ben are going to talk about the state level, the new york experience, and we're all really excited to hear about what you're doing in north carolina. we're going to leave it to phil and larry to really kind of look at the national political picture and really give us the vision of what di wants to accomplish and how. but i'm going to start with senator merkley because we do have this, hopefully, we hope we have a shorter-term opportunity in the next month, and we all, you know, we've got a lot of people here who i think back what you're doing incredibly and want to be as helpful as possible to you if you have ideas about that. but tell us exactly what's going on in your discussions and what we m

>>> if you've been watching the show and i hope you have, we'll talk to ben jealous the head of the naacpstaffers and he's standing by their side. so, he's going to deal with that emergency and we're going to get him on as soon as we can because it's an important discussion and we wish the staffer the best. >>> obviously, the tragic death of act aer cory monteith it was an overdose that killed him. >>> first up this hour from maine to ohio, a stifling heat wave is making life difficult for millions of americans. temperatures in the 90s but will feel like it is in the 100s. look at this map and all the deep red that you will see right there. the heat waves hitting the middle east, the mid-atlantic. indra petersons is live in new york's times square and yes, it's summer, it's hot. but this is hotter than hot. >> that's what we talk about, july typically hot but these degrees are ten degrees above normal and you throw in the humidity and the ooppressive heat and the danger that is affecting a big chung k of the country today. let's take a look. dang temperatures from the midwest to the north

ben jealous, the president was excited coal fired plants are closing. that means a loss of jobs. with high unemployment and lower disposable income with higher energy prices. >>steve: i was paying attention to what was going on down there yesterday. it was clear they are trying to use the trayvon martin death as a rallying cry for change. when you look at it, do you see this as a racese? >> no. it wasn't. because they're both minorities, first of all. you had the media and those on the left who injected race into this issue early on when in fact it's been decided by the f.b.i. with their investigation plus with the ruling that he was not a racist. this is a horrible tragedy. my heart goes out to the parents of trayvon martin. but it was not an issue about race. >>steve: but when you watch some of the channels or listen to some of the radio or read some of the blog, it was clearly racist, they say. >> they tried to carry that narrative. at the end of the day this is about the 2014 election coming up. the black vote was extremely important for president obama. he's losing some of t

just on with our colleague, candy crowley, talking about how civil rights leaders like himself, ben jealous justice department to file and bring civil rights charges against your brother. and even the florida state attorney kind of talked about that last night after the verdict. what do you say to that? >> i think that i would encourage mr. jealous, who i describe as a self-professed civil rights leader, i don't think he does anything for civil rights by perpetuating a narrative that has now been proven false. and calling for an arrest and then a conviction and it didn't happen. so now there's more agitation by the same players that were insisting that george was a murderer and a racist to begin with. >> but the justice department is gathering information. the justice department is not directly responding to the n ii request, but they are gatherering information. >> and i think they've investigated about three dozen of his closest friends and acquaintances and there is not any inkling of racism. in fact, there's evidence to show the opposite. i would encourage them to cool their jets, give

jealous, ben, thank you for being with us tonight. >> thank you, rachel. >> your organization is asking doj to file civil rights charges against mr. zimmerman in this case. what kind of feedback have you had from your call for that? how are people responding to that as an idea? >> first of all, the country has responded in a ways that's just incredible. we have almost 1 million signatures just since the verdict, and that includes the fact that our servers were down for over 12 hours because they were, the traffic, the volume was too much for them to handle. at one point, we were getting about 100 signatures per second. and this just tells, and these are people of all colors from across the country who just believe our country can do better than what happened in sanford. and who believe that the u.s. doj has a role to play in protecting all our children. from people who would track them and taunt them and confront them and kill them on the street. and ultimately choose to engage because of their color. and there's a lot of disturbing information. let's not forget witness number 9. george

in my hand that you sent to attorney general holder signed by yourself and reverend sharpton and ben jealousan egregious violation of the most fundamental of civil rights. the right of life. anyone who takes another life for any reason then would be open to federal civil rights charges. >> well, you know, the letter wasn't meant to frame the legal arguments that the justice department might use in bringing a case, but to point to the fact that trayvon martin had every right to be where he was. he was an unarmed teen. he was in the neighborhood where his father lived, where he was staying. he was going to the store to buy skittles and ice tea. and he was stalked. he was hunted down. and he lost his life. and we think that we have got a point to the fact, continue to point to what happened on that night, because i think when the public understands that, they will recognize why there's such an outrage that this not only occurred, but that in effect the tables got turned and the aggressor claimed self-defense and, in effect, was exonerated. now, today with the vigils that are taking place across