“These laws try to fix something that was never broken,” Holder said in a previously-scheduled speech to the NAACP convention in Orlando that marked the Obama administration’s first new policy announcement since neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman was acquitted last weekend in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin.
More than 30 states have passed Stand Your Ground laws, which eliminate the duty to retreat before using deadly force in self defense.
Holder insisted he wasn’t commenting on the Martin-Zimmerman case, which is under investigation by the Justice Department for a possible federal civil rights prosecution. However, the attorney general made clear that he views the Stand Your Ground measures as unwisely provocative.