Trump under fire over ‘blame on both sides’ Charlottesville comment
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK
Trump, who drew sharp criticism from Republicans and Democrats for his initial response, reverted on Aug. 15 to his position that both sides were at fault for the violence, a day after bowing to pressure to explicitly condemn the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups.
Appearing angry and irritated, the president maintained that his original reaction was based on the facts he had at the time. In a rowdy exchange with journalists at Trump Tower in New York, Trump made clea that he was fed up with continued questioning about the issue. Blame, he said, belonged on both sides.
"You had a group on one side that was bad, and you had a group on the other side that was also very violent. And nobody wants to say that, but I'll say it right now," Trump said, referring to right- and left-wing protesters.
From there, the back and forth with reporters turned tense.
"Not all of those people were neo-Nazis, believe me. Not all of those people were white supremacists by any stretch," Trump said of the participants in the deadly protest.
"There was a group on this side. You can call them the left ... that came violently attacking the other group. So you can say what you want, but that's the way it is."
As Trump talked, his aides on the sidelines in the lobby stood in silence. Chief of staff John Kelly crossed his arms and stared down at his shoes, barely glancing at the president. Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders looked around the room trying to make eye contact with other senior aides. One young staffer stood with her mouth agape.
The violence erupted on Aug. 12 after white nationalists converged in Charlottesville for a "Unite the Right" rally in protest of plans to remove a statue of Robert E. Lee, commander of the pro-slavery Confederate army during the U.S. Civil War.
Many of the rally participants were seen carrying firearms, sticks and shields. Some also wore helmets. Counter-protesters likewise came equipped with sticks, helmets and shields.
The two sides clashed in scattered street brawls before a car plowed into the rally opponents, killing one woman and injuring 19 others. A 20-year-old Ohio man, James Fields, said to have harbored Nazi sympathies, was charged with murder.
Two state police officers also were killed that day in the fiery crash of the helicopter they were flying in as part of crowd-control operations.
Addressing the melee for the first time on Aug. 12, Trump denounced hatred and violence "on many sides." The comment drew sharp criticism across the political spectrum for not explicitly condemning the white nationalists whose presence in the southern college town was widely seen as having provoked the unrest.
Critics said Trump's remarks then belied his reluctance to alienate extreme right-wing groups, whose followers constitute a devoted segment of his political base despite his disavowal of them.
Yielding two days later to a mounting political furor over his initial response, Trump delivered a follow-up message expressly referring to the "KKK, neo-Nazis and white supremacists and other hate groups" as "repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans."
Trump's detractors dismissed his revised statements as too little too late.
His remarks on Aug. 15 inflamed the controversy further.
Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke immediately applauded Trump on Twitter.
"Thank you President Trump for your honesty and courage to tell the truth about #Charlottesville and condemn the leftist terrorists in BLM/Antifa," Duke wrote, referring to Black Lives Matter (BLM) and anti-facists.
Democrats seized on Trump's latest words as evidence that Trump saw white nationalists and those protesting against them as morally equivalent.
"By saying he is not taking sides, Donald Trump clearly is," said Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer of New York.
"When David Duke and white supremacists cheer your remarks, you're doing it very, very wrong."
In a similar vein, Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, said Trump's characterization of the violence missed the mark.
"Neo-Nazis, Klansmen and white supremacists came to Charlottesville heavily armed, spewing hatred and looking for a fight. One of them murdered a young woman in an act of domestic terrorism, and two of our finest officers were killed in a tragic accident while serving to protect this community. This was not 'both sides,'" he said.
Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida said Trump should not allow white supremacists “to share only part of the blame.” House Speaker Paul Ryan declared in a tweet that “white supremacy is repulsive” and there should be “no moral ambiguity,” though he did not specifically address the president.
Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine said on Twitter that the Charlottesville violence “was fueled by one side: white supremacists spreading racism, intolerance & intimidation. Those are the facts.” Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii said on Twitter that he no longer views Trump as his president.
“As a Jew, as an American, as a human, words cannot express my disgust and disappointment,” Schatz said. “This is not my president.”
A tweet by former President Barack Obama soon after the violence had garnered 2.8 million "likes" to become the most liked Twitter message ever by Aug. 15, the social media network said.
"No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion...," Obama said in the tweet on Aug. 12, accompanying a picture of himself looking through an open window at a group of children.
Administration officials, hoping to put the controversy behind them after the remarks on Aug. 14, worried that the controversy would now last for days and, potentially, affect the president's ability to achieve legislative and policy goals.
Asked about the White House's next steps, one official said: "I think next steps are just to stop talking."
In his remarks on Aug. 15, Trump also sympathized with protesters seeking to keep Lee's statue in place but offered no equivalent remarks for those who favored its removal.
"You had people in that group ... that were there to protest the taking down of a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name," he said.
Trump also grouped former presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, two of the nation's founding fathers, together with Confederate leaders such as Lee, Jefferson Davis and Stonewall Jackson, who fought to separate Southern states from the Union, noting that all were slave owners.
"Was George Washington a slave owner? Will George Washington now lose his status? Are we going to take down statues to George Washington? How about Thomas Jefferson? ... Because he was a major slave owner," Trump said.
On Aug. 15, Trump explained his initial restrained response by saying: "The statement I made on Saturday [Aug. 12], the first statement, was a fine statement, but you don't make statements that direct unless you know the facts. It takes a little while to get the facts."
In what became at times a heated exchange with reporters shouting questions, Trump said, "You also had people that were very fine people on both sides."
He said that while neo-Nazis and white nationalists "should be condemned totally," protesters in the other group "also had trouble-makers. And you see them come with the black outfits and with the helmets and with the baseball bats. You got a lot of bad people in the other group too."
Pressed as to whether he might visit Charlottesville, Trump -- criticised by some for not telephoning victims of the violence -- said he owns “one of the largest wineries in the United States” in that area.
The president bought the winery in 2011 and has given it to his son, Eric Trump.
Outside Trump Tower where the president spoke, hundreds of people protested to denounce racism. They were surrounded by police officers to prevent clashes with a handful of Trump supporters nearby.
Trump’s remarks left White House officials bracing for fallout from disappointed Republicans whose support he needs to govern in the coming months and years.
Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO labor federation representing 12.5 million workers, became the latest member of Trump’s advisory American Manufacturing Council to resign in protest.
“We cannot sit on a council for a president who tolerates bigotry and domestic terrorism,” Trumka said.
“President Trump’s remarks today repudiate his forced remarks yesterday about the KKK and neo-Nazis.”
Three other members of the council - the chief executives of pharmaceutical maker Merck Co Inc, sportswear company Under Armour Inc and computer chipmaker Intel Corp - resigned on Aug. 14.
Trump’s political supporters embrace his style, and the back-and-forth with reporters on Aug. 15 was an example of a characteristic that defines him, said a former adviser: a dislike for being criticized or pressured.
“When you push the president to do something, he’s not going to do it. He’s going to make a point not to do it,” said Sam Nunberg, a former campaign aide.