WASHINGTON—In the angriest public tirade of his two years in national politics, U.S. President Donald Trump departed from his rebuke of white supremacists to deliver a remarkable denunciation of what he called the “alt-left,” blaming anti-Fascist protesters, rather than neo-Nazis alone, for the violence in Charlottesville on Saturday.Trump had bowed to withering national criticism and delivered a sombre prepared statement on Monday in which he belatedly denounced the white racists, one of whom is accused of murdering a liberal protester. But he revealed his true feelings in a Tuesday rant at Trump Tower, alleging that the left-wing counter protesters were “violently attacking the other group” with baseball bats and “without a permit.”“That’s the way it is,” he said acidly, accusing the media of unfairly pinning all the blame on the right-wing side.Trump also took pains to defend the right-wingers. Though the demonstration involved people with Nazi flags and other Nazi symbols, plus leading “alt-right” white supremacists who do not identify as neo-Nazis, Trump declared, “Not all of those people were neo-Nazis.”“Define alt-right to me. No, define it for me,” he challenged reporters.The white nationalist demonstration, he said, also included good people who were merely opposed to the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee, the general who commanded the forces of the pro-slavery Confederate secessionists. In his most explicit endorsement of Confederate icons, he argued that removing statues of Lee would lead the country down a slippery slope.“George Washington was a slave owner ... so will George Washington, now, lose his status?” Trump asked. “You’re changing history. You’re changing culture,” he said.
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