President Obama has praised the protesters whose stand against racism at the University of Missouri resulted this week in the resignation of the institution’s president and the announcement that its chancellor would step down at the end of the year.

Mizzou Tigers score welcome win after week of racial tension and resignations Read more

“I think it is entirely appropriate for students in a thoughtful, peaceful way to protest what they see as injustices or inattention to serious problems in their midst,” the president told ABC’s host George Stephanopoulos in an interview recorded on Thursday and broadcast, in part, on Sunday morning.

Staff from nine departments joined Mizzou student protesters in calling for college president Tim Wolfe and chancellor R Bowen Loftin to resign, over a lack of responsiveness to incidents of racial prejudice on and around campus.

In a move which attracted national attention, the school’s storied football team, with the support of its coaches, said it would not play until Wolfe resigned. One student went on hunger strike. Michael Sam, the Mizzou grad who became the first openly gay player to be drafted by an NFL team, attended some protests.



After Wolfe announced his resignation, the university appointed an African American administrator, Mike Middleton, as its interim president. Tensions on campus have not entirely dissipated.

Obama has previously praised the Black Lives Matter movement, which gained strength after the death last year of Michael Brown, an unarmed African American teenager, at the hands of a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri. Columbia is only 100 miles or so away.

Speaking to ABC in the interview, the president added: “I want an activist student body just like I want an activist citizenry, and the issue is just making sure that even as these young people are getting engaged, getting involved, speaking out, that they’re also listening.



“I’d rather see them err on the side of activism than being passive.

“The civil rights movement happened because there was civil disobedience,” he said, making a historical parallel to the Mizzou protests, “because people were willing to go to jail, because there were events like Bloody Sunday.

How racial justice advocates took on Mizzou and won Read more

“But it was also because the leadership of the movement consistently stayed open to the possibility of reconciliation and sought to understand the views – even views that were appalling to them – of the other side.

“You don’t have to be fearful of somebody spouting bad ideas. Just out-argue them. Beat them. Make the case as to why they’re wrong. Win over adherents.”

Obama said he encouraged his two daughters, Malia and Sasha, to make such arguments and to stand up against injustice where they found it.

“And, you know, I tell you, I trust Malia in an argument,” the president said. “If a knucklehead on a college campus starts talking about her, I guarantee you she will give as good as she gets.”