Trump complains about 'dishonest' media, then tweets defense of Confederate statues

Christopher Rosen
Updated
Trump their typo: President makes another mistake on Twitter

Hours after President Donald Trump complained about what he called the “dishonest” media for “misinterpret[ing]” his remarks about “hate” and “bigotry” in the wake of the Charlottesville, Virginia, white nationalist riots, Trump defended Confederate monuments as “beautiful.”

“Sad to see the history and culture of our great country being ripped apart with the removal of our beautiful statues and monuments,” Trump wrote. “You can’t change history, but you can learn from it. Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson – who’s next, Washington, Jefferson? So foolish! Also, the beauty that is being taken out of our cities, towns, and parks will be greatly missed and never able to be comparably replaced!”

Trump’s latest tweets were slammed on Twitter.

Trump’s new comments echo similar ones he made on Tuesday, remarks that were denounced as “racist,” “disgraceful,” and “obscene.”

“George Washington was a slave owner. Was George Washington a slave owner?” Trump said to reporters, conflating the nation’s first president with Confederate general Robert E. Lee. “So will George Washington now lose his status? Are we going to take down statues to George Washington? How about Thomas Jefferson? What do you think of Thomas Jefferson? … Are we going to take down the statue? Because he was a major slave owner.”

The white nationalist riots started as a protest over the removal of a Lee statue in Virginia. “It’s fine: You’re changing history, you’re changing culture, and you had people — and I’m not talking about the neo Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally,” Trump said of the protestors. “But you had many people in that group other than neo Nazis and white nationalists and the press has treated them absolutely unfairly. In the other group also, you had fine people but you also had troublemakers.”

The president’s statements were widely reported verbatim via transcripts and videos. But on Thursday, before defending the Confederate monuments, Trump claimed without examples, “The public is learning (even more so) how dishonest the Fake News is. They totally misrepresent what I say about hate, bigotry etc. Shame!”