[NEWS] Trump stands by remarks on Charlottesville: George Washington was a slave owner

NEW YORK — President Trump appeared at his Manhattan skyscraper to deliver a statement on infrastructure on Tuesday and ended up in a heated debate with reporters over the protests and violence that took place in Charlottesville, Va., last weekend.

Trump said there was “blame on both sides” for the clashes, which involved white nationalists and neo-Nazis fighting against counterprotesters. He praised some of the people who showed up to protest the removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee in the town as “fine people.”

Trump told Yahoo News the question of whether Confederate memorials should stay standing should be left up to local officials, and suggested that eliminating Confederate memorials would open the door to the removal of other historical monuments such as those honoring George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

“George Washington was a slave owner,” Trump pointed out.

Charlottesville’s bloody weekend began Friday evening when a group of people protesting the Lee statue’s removal held a torchlit march at the University of Virginia. The group, which included prominent white supremacists and neo-Nazis, was marching as a prelude to a planned rally on Saturday.

The rally was preempted by violence that left three people dead, including two Virginia police officers who were killed in a helicopter crash while patroling the situation. Heather Heyer, a young woman who was with a group of counterprotesters, died after she was hit by a car that authorities say was driven by a demonstrator with Nazi sympathies. The president has not yet reached out to the woman’s family to offer condolences.

Trump was widely criticized for his initial response to the violence, in which he laid blame on both sides while avoiding any specific mention of white nationalism or neo-Nazis. On Tuesday, he called his reaction “excellent,” saying he was speaking without knowing all the facts. In comments Monday from the White House, he gave a more explicit denunciation of racism as “evil” and called out groups including the Ku Klux Klan.

Many of the white supremacists and neo-Nazis who were involved in the clashes in Charlottesville have praised Trump, before and after his Monday denunciation. Yahoo News asked Trump why he thinks Nazis like him.

“They don’t,” Trump said.

Trump moved on to other questions and did not respond as Yahoo News listed examples of neo-Nazis and white supremacists who have expressed support for him.

Trump appeared before the reporters in the Trump Tower lobby to discuss an executive order he signed on Tuesday that he said would “dramatically reform the nation’s badly broken infrastructure permitting process.” Staffers told reporters he would not be taking questions. The president dismissed the current state of American infrastructure as “Third World” and said his order would bring the country “world-class infrastructure.”

Although Trump, visibly agitated, kept trying to turn the subject back to infrastructure, the events in Charlottesville and his response dominated the session. The first question from reporters was about the four CEOs who quit the White House Manufacturing Council to protest his remarks. Trump, who had earlier dismissed the CEOs as “grandstanders,” replied they were “not taking their job seriously.”

Two more members of the council, including AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, resigned later on Tuesday afternoon.

Trump was then asked why he waited until Monday to make a statement about Charlottesville that explicitly denounced white nationalism and racism as “evil.” The president said he could not have made that comment “sooner” because he “didn’t know all of the facts.”

“I didn’t wait long. I wanted to make sure, unlike most politicians, that what I said was correct, not make a quick statement. … The statement I made on Saturday was a fine statement,” Trump said.

Trump contrasted his response to reporters who do not take the time to ascertain accurate information.

“I had to see the facts, unlike a lot of reporters,” said Trump.

Trump was also asked about the car that plowed into the protesters and whether he thinks it was an act of terrorism. He denounced the alleged perpetrator, who has been identified in court as James Alex Fields Jr., and expressed hope the man would face a swift punishment.

“I think the driver of the car is a disgrace to himself, his family and this country,” Trump said, adding, “You can call it terrorism, you can call it murder, you can call it whatever you want. I would just call it as the fastest one to come up with a good verdict. That’s what I’d call it.”

Trump went on to suggest the question of whether it was an act of terrorism is “semantics.”

“There is a question, Is it murder? Is it terrorism? And then you get into legal semantics. The driver of the car is a murderer and what he did was a horrible, horrible, inexcusable thing,” Trump said.

The car attack left 19 people injured in addition to killing Heyer. Fields, who was denied bail on Monday, is charged with hit and run, three counts of malicious wounding, and second degree murder in Heyer’s death.

In his comments on Tuesday, Trump said he had heard Heyer was “a fantastic young woman.” While Trump said he had not called Heyer’s family to give his condolences, he implied he would do so. Trump also noted that Heyer’s mother posted a tweet thanking him for his second statement that denounced white supremacists. He expressed happiness that Heyer’s mother had said the “nicest things” about him.

“I very much appreciated that,” Trump explained.