A Texas teenager arrested after a home-made clock he brought to school was mistaken for a bomb has capped a whirlwind month with a visit to the White House and a chat with President Barack Obama.
Ahmed Mohamed received a personal invitation from Obama for Astronomy Night, an event the president uses to encourage young people to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. The two met and talked briefly.
Ahmed, 14, said he was grateful for the president’s support and said he was OK with the “clock kid” nickname that so many have given him over the past few weeks. He said the lesson of his experience was: “Don’t judge a person by the way they look. Always judge them by their heart.”
The teenager brought the clock to MacArthur High School in Irving last month to show a teacher, but another teacher thought it could be a bomb. The school contacted police, who ultimately chose not to charge Ahmed with having a hoax bomb, although he was suspended from school for three days.
Obama subsequently tweeted an invitation to Ahmed and said the US should inspire more pupils like him to enjoy science.
Ahmed’s family is looking at several options for a new school. He hopes to eventually go to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and become an engineer.
But the White House invitation brought some backlash. Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz complained that Obama did not give police the same respect he was giving Ahmed.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the president had made clear in many settings the respect he had for law enforcement officers.
Ahmed said he had visited Google and Facebook, along with other companies and institutions in recent weeks. He also travelled to Sudan where he met President Omar Bashir, which has prompted some criticism because Bashir is wanted by the International Criminal Court on genocide and war crimes charges for atrocities linked to fighting in Darfur.
Advisers deflected a question on that topic and instructed Ahmed to not answer. Ahmed’s family are Sudanese immigrants and his father is a former presidential candidate.
