Trump’s refusal to condemn alt-right draws bipartisan ire
Protests over the removal of a Robert E. Lee statue from a Charlottesville, VA park culminated in a car being driven into a crowd of anti-alt-right protesters, with one person left dead. President Donald Trump has taken a break from his working holiday to return to Washington among a storm of bipartisan criticism, as he apparently refuses to specifically condemn far-right groups for their role in the escalating violence.
Mr. Trump is facing strong calls from within his own party to describe the attack as “an act of domestic terrorism,” while Democrats are unified in their criticism; Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii tweeting, “It is not too much to ask to have a President who explicitly condemns nazis.”
Meanwhile, the president’s unusual silence has been linked to alt-right support for his 2016 presidential campaign, which he disavowed only after weathering a few days of heavy pressure from both sides of the aisle. With tension mounting, a response must surely be coming.
