Trump: 'There's Blame On Both Sides' In Charlottesville Attack
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NEW YORK (CBSMiami/AP) — President Trump says "there is blame on both sides" after getting criticized for his comments on a deadly attack in Charlottesville, Virginia over the weekend.
Trump's remarks on his home turf at Trump Tower in New York City followed a more deliberate statement he made Monday in Washington. Reading from prepared remarks inside the White House, he said then that "racism is evil" and branded members of the KKK, neo-Nazis and white supremacists who take part in violence as "criminals and thugs."
That statement followed sharp and unrelenting criticism, including from many top Republican lawmakers, of his more general Saturday remarks bemoaning violence on "many sides."
Yet during an impromptu press conference Tuesday, Trump seemed to undo what he said a day earlier.
He praised his own controversial Saturday statement, even pulling it from his suit pocket to read it again.
And he followed that recitation by angrily laying blame on liberal groups in addition to white supremacists for the Charlottesville violence. Some of those protesting the rally to save a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee were "also very violent," he said.
"There are two sides to a story," he said. He added that some facts about the violence in Charlottesville still aren't known.
(© Copyright 2017 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
