Chaos in Charlottesville

In Charlottesville, Virginia, two separate marches occurred. There was “Unite the Right” rally against the removal of a Confederate statue of General Robert E. Lee. There were white supremacists and people carrying Nazi flags, who took part in the rally. Also, there were anti-racist counter-demonstrators, who marched against the gathering of the white supremacists. Eventually, people on both sides resorted to violence and clashed with each other.

“Once they [the white supremacists] started marching, they did not talk about Robert E. Lee being a brilliant military tactician,” Elle Reeve, Vice New Reporter, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “They chanted about Jews. Like, they wanted to be menacing. It was not an accident.”

President Trump came under fire for not directly denouncing alternative right groups. Instead, he went back and forth between saying many sides were at fault and not speaking out against the KKK, neo-Nazis, and white supremacists.

The Charlottesville police department was also criticized for its failure to separate the protesters and counter-protesters. The Charlottesville police chief Al Thomas defended the response from the police at the rally.

According to the police, James Alex Fields, Jr., 20, from Ohio was arrested and charged with second-degree murder. Fields was the one who rammed his car into anti-racist protesters and killed 32-year-old Heather Heyer, while injuring several others.

“I have done nothing wrong,” said Jason Kessler, the pro-white organizer of the “Unite the Right” rally and founder of Unity and Security for America.

However, Kessler stated in a tweet, “Heather Heyer was a fat, disgusting Communist. Communists have killed 94 million. Looks like it was payback time.”

After the tweet, Kessler claimed that he was drinking and taking drugs. His account has since been deleted.

The chaos in Charlottesville has shaken up the residents and people around the country. Several African Americans in the town told USA Today that they did not feel as safe as they used to. In addition, the residents are traumatized by the recent turn of events and disillusioned by the institutions in the city.

Following the Charlottesville rally, several “Unite the Right” rallies were cancelled, and rallies against racism took place around the country.