Trump Again Blames Both Sides In Charlottesville, Says Some Counterprotesters Were ‘Very, Very Violent’

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President Donald Trump said Tuesday that counterprotesters at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville acted violently and should share the blame for the mayhem that left a woman dead and many injured.

Speaking at Trump Tower in Manhattan, the president called the events of Saturday at the “Unite the Right” rally a “horrible thing to watch,” but he emphasized that both sides acted irresponsibly.

“You had a group on one side that was bad and you had a group on the other side that was also very violent,” Trump said. “No one wants to say that, but I’ll say it right now: You had a group on the other side that came charging in without a permit and they were very, very violent.”

Trump’s remarks came a day after he belatedly condemned the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis and other hate groups that organized and participated in the rally. He had faced mounting pressure from lawmakers and civil rights groups over his failure to do so during his initial reaction to the violence, when he denounced violence “on many sides.”

But Tuesday, Trump defended his handling of the Charlottesville situation, stating he did not want to jump to conclusions in his initial remarks. “There was no way of making a correct statement that early,” he said in an impromptu news conference in the lobby of Trump Tower, after an announcement about infrastructure. “I had to see the facts, unlike a lot of reporters.”

Trump called the driver of the car that killed counterprotester Heather Heyer, 32, and injured 19 a “disgrace to himself, his family and the country,” but he stopped short of declaring the action a case of “domestic terrorism,” calling that an exercise in semantics. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has said that the act fits that definition, and the Justice Department has launched a federal civil rights probe into Heyer’s death. Prosecutors have charged James Alex Fields Jr. of Ohio, who has reportedly espoused Nazi propaganda and participated in the rally, with the crime.

“You can call it terrorism. You can call it murder. You can call it whatever you want,” Trump said. “I call it the fastest outcome to a good verdict . . . You get into legal semantics. The driver of the car was a murderer. What he did was a horrible, horrible, inexcusable thing.”

Trump emphasized repeatedly that he believed many of the “Unite the Right” rally participants were not members of hate groups and were there to protest the pending removal by the city of a statue of the Confederate general Robert E. Lee.

“You had people in that group who were protesting the taking down of what to them is a very, very important statue,” Trump said, before suggesting that Lee and other Confederate-era generals, including Stonewall Jackson, are the victims of historical revisionism attempting to delegitimize their roles.

Speaking rhetorically, Trump asked reporters whether George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, both slave owners, should suffer the same fate and have their statues removed. “You’re changing history; you’re changing culture,” he said.

Trump reiterated his condemnation of Nazis and other white supremacists. But he also made clear that he believed that some of the counterprotesters were armed and took aggressive actions that helped spark the violence.

“What about the alt-left that came charging at the alt-right – do they have any semblance of guilt?” Trump said. “They came charging, clubs in hand, swinging clubs.”

(c) 2017, The Washington Post · David Nakamura 

{Matzav.com}


6 COMMENTS

  1. The President is 100% Correct. The nazi bastards and white supremacists (WS) are garbage but they were there peacefully protesting joined by hundreds of normal people who were there to protest the removal of American History. The Alt-Left protesters, many of who were summoned by and funded by Anti-Jewish, Anti-American George Sorosh, did not have a permit to be there. Many of them arrived in body armor and physically attacked the “pro-statue” group. This Alt-Left group consisted of BLM (Black Lives Matter), Communists and other anarchists. These groups and the nazi-WS groups all belong in the garbage. I hate nazi’s (all my parent’s families were destroyed by them) and WS but after reviewing the videos from different sources, I can attest to the fact that the Alt-Left was responsible for the violence that day in NC. That one lunatic with the speeding car was responsible for the woman’s murder and all the injuries that occurred by his stupidity. A powder keg that exploded. It’s too bad that the police didn’t do much. They seemed to be overwhelmed.

    • “Nazis peacefully protesting”. If your family was indeed killed by the nazis YM”S I would think they’d be rolling in their graves from your comment. NOTHING about Nazis is peaceful. I can’t believe what I’m seeing! The mere fact that they are Nazis is an act of aggression.

  2. What about in crown heights 1991 pogrom. Three people were killed. Police were told for three days to stand by. Not one politician spoke up. Only senator demato an Italian conservative. The liberal slime politicians hid under their blankets. Not one word. Why. Because mayor Dinkins the black liberal mayor told police, Let them vent their frustrations. Three murders. One Yankel Rosenbaum a yeshiva boy from Australia. Two an elderly holcaust woman survivor who when seeing the violent march passing her apartment building thought the holicaust was happening again. She jumped out the window to her death. Three an Italian man driving by crown heights was shot dead because they mistook him for a Jew because he had a beard. These are the facts. All these anti Trump protesters in manhattan who cry nazis, would be there anyway if Trump came. It has nothing to do with the incident in Virginia. Orthodox Jews voted Trump for good reasons. And we will again.

  3. Chaimyankel,
    To be perfectly clear, I did not nor do I defend nazis. I do defend the rights we as Jews and others have in this great country. Unfortunately, those rights are extended to garbage like nazis, white supremacists, Black Lives matter, Nation of Islam, etc. I hope you condemn these hate groups as I do but I fought for all the citizens of the United States (I’m a VN Veteran – US Army) to be able to enjoy all of those rights that we have under our Constitution.
    As I stated in the previous comment, a group of individuals with the intent of saving the monuments (not the nazis and WS) got a permit to assemble and did so peacefully even though they were infiltrated by the nazis and ws. Their left wing opponents made up of BLM, Anarchists and Communists came from all over the country to attack the pro-monument group. The lefties were wearing body armor and had bricks, bats, bottles and an assortment of weapons. They had no permit to assemble and basically came to charlottesville to riot and cause damage.
    As a Jew which side would you take? In your comment you seem to be taking the side of the lefties.
    In this “battle” nobody won.
    A young woman lost her life and a bunch of people were injured by a lunatic with a car.
    Help me understand. One Muslim Terrorist doesn’t represent All of Islam…….But one White Supremacist Idiot represents everyone who voted for Donald Trump?

  4. Amazing times. There is hope in Hashem.

    Mr. Trump is a man who can not find his faith in G-d other than a look at his big red tie. It is consistent.

    Seriously, this man has hurt so many people in his lifetime. How can he sleep at night at all? He doesn’t!

    So we see a mayhem of office and a mayhem of community. The world is at Hashem’s mercy.

    Love G-d. This is the most interesting hard war we have ever fought in our lives in America against Antisemitism and all that has been noted. The president is weak to humor and horror to any human feeling of good constitution.

    The thought of a future with good faith is good hope. We can hope that G-d has a plan even with Trump in office. The world is not always the pawn of human existence.

    Careful bible reading ahead.

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