Obama, George W. Bush to speak at memorial service for Dallas officers

(Image credit: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images)

last updated 11 July 2016

President Barack Obama and former President George W. Bush will speak Tuesday in Dallas at an interfaith memorial service for five police officers killed last week during an ambush targeting law enforcement.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said in a statement Sunday that Obama was invited by Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings, and the president will meet with the families of the officers. In a later statement, it was announced that Bush, a former governor of Texas, would also attend. The service will take place at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, with Vice President Joe Biden and former first lady Laura Bush also in attendance. Obama is cutting short a European trip to visit Dallas, and thanked the people of Spain and King Felipe VI for "understanding" that his trip had to be abbreviated due to a "difficult week back in the United States."

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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