Obama addressed a tension he'd noticed among young people during the George Floyd protests: the debate between direct action and voting, as if the two were mutually exclusive. He refused to choose sides. 'We need both,' he said. Peaceful protests were patriotic — they shone a light on injustice and made those in charge uncomfortable 'in a way that's healthy.' But he was equally insistent that aspirations had to be 'translated into specific laws and institutional practices,' which only happened through elections — including local offices like mayor and district attorney that 'don't get as much attention as a presidential race, but have the most direct impact on issues like how communities are policed.' The warning against cynicism was aimed at both sides: those who dismissed protest as futile and those who dismissed voting as inadequate.