His unscripted Charlottesville comments showed where his sympathies truly lie.
Trump’s reluctance to denounce hate groups and individuals during his presidential campaign, as now, is simply because the President is a white nationalist and racist, and he believes that he is superior to others. Hate groups are Trump’s people.
If anyone didn’t believe it previous to today, today’s press conference should leave no doubt.
Vox’s Dara Lind writes, “President Trump wants to be entirely clear: He blames both sides for the violence in Charlottesville that killed one person and injured dozens.
“Despite the prepared statement he read Monday, Trump doesn’t particularly feel that white nationalists were to blame for the violence. He thinks the “alt-left” was charging at marchers with clubs. He thinks a torch-lit march in which people did Nazi salutes, chanted, “Sieg Heil!” and assaulted counter-protesters was a good example of people “very quietly protesting.” And he thinks the violence distracted from the rally’s laudable aim, to defend a statue of Robert E. Lee.
“What Trump said Tuesday, in an unscripted press conference, made explicit all the darkest undertones of his gallingly weak statement from Saturday. In the face of a “Nazified” rally that left an American citizen dead, he muddied the waters (all but lying about what happened over the weekend) and softened his judgment of the march itself.
“After Saturday’s statement, white nationalists celebrated Trump’s support for them, while Americans of color worried that they had been abandoned. Tuesday’s remarks are nearly certain to convince both sides they were right.”
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders says, “President Trump, you are embarrassing our country and the millions of Americans who fought and died to defeat Nazism. The violence in Charlottesville was not caused by the "alt-left," (whatever that may be). It was caused by Neo-Nazis and white supremacists who are attempting to spread their hateful and racist ideology.”
The real Donald Trump has stood up... again.
There will be no pivot. There never was going to be.
There will be no becoming presidential. There never was going to be.
There will be no humility. No decorum. No sense of justice or empathy. There never was going to be.
We are far past the time for excuses, for anyone.
In one of the most surreal and depressing presidential press conferences ever, Mr. Trump said what most people dreaded but already knew. His blatant false equivalence between Nazis and those who oppose them that he said on Saturday, that's how he really feels - times a thousand.
With any other president, this would be unbelievable. But with Mr. Trump, it is all too believable. It is clear that he doesn't consider himself to be the President of the United States of America - no matter what his official job title says. Down where he lives he is the president of his base, which includes a lot of bigots and even Nazis and members of the Klan. Not everyone who voted for him is in this category, not nearly. But they make up a large majority of his personal base. And thankfully for all of us, this is a distinct (but frightening) minority of our nation. The vast majority of Americans are decent people of conscience. And I believe in the end this vast majority will prevail.
The question is whether those who defend the President or seeks to normalize him or change the subject will be seen as worse than enablers. Will they be viewed by history as sympathizers to the worst instincts of American hatred?
By Dara Lind
