President Donald Trump has admitted that the killing of George Floyd was "terrible" but refused to answer a question about police violence against Black Americans, instead of pointing out that "more white people" were the victims of police violence.

Floyd, a black handcuffed man, died in Minneapolis police custody on May 25 after Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis officer, pinned him to the ground and kneeled on his neck for nearly nine minutes, ignoring his repeated cries of ‘I can’t breathe.’

During an interview with CBS News senior investigative correspondent Catherine Herridge, Trump was asked why Black Americans are "still dying at the hands of law enforcement in this country."

The president immediately pivoted.

"And so are white people, so are white people," Trump replied.

"What a terrible question to ask. So are white people, more white people, by the way, more white people," Trump continued

Trump’s claim about more white people being killed by police in the US is misleading.

The Guardian’s investigative project The Counted in 2015-2016 that set out to record all people in the US killed by police showed that Black people in America were more than twice as likely to be killed by the police than white people.

And in 2016 Black men ages 15-34 were nine times more likely than other Americans to be killed by law enforcement officers, and they were killed at four times the rate of young white men.

A similar 2016 analysis by The Washington Post also found that African Americans are 2.5 times as likely to be shot and killed by police offers as white Americans.

Another study published in the American Journal of Public Health in 2018 found that African Americans are 3.5 times as likely to be killed by police compared to white people.