McAuliffe Counters Critics of Police Response to Charlottesville Violence
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERGCHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — Gov. Terry McAuliffe on Sunday strongly defended the police response to the violent demonstrations here on Saturday, saying that law enforcement authorities had done “great work” in “a very delicate situation.”
Governor McAuliffe, in an impromptu interview before addressing two church congregations on Sunday morning, said the police estimated that 80 percent of those at the white nationalists’ rally and counterprotests — including members of self-styled militias in camouflage gear — were armed, “yet not a shot was fired.”
He also said the death of a 32-year-old woman, Heather D. Heyer, who was killed when a driver intentionally plowed his car into a crowd, could not have been prevented, calling it “car terrorism.”
“You can’t stop some crazy guy who came here from Ohio and used his car as a weapon,” Governor McAuliffe said. “He is a terrorist.”
The police and other law enforcement officials have been criticized for their handling of the event, including by Jason Kessler, the organizer of the so-called Unite the Right rally. In a statement, he complained that the authorities had “exacerbated the violence” by failing to separate his followers from counterprotesters, leading to the melee.
Mr. Kessler said his group had “networked with law enforcement officials” months ago on a plan for maintaining safety, which he said was not followed, and he called the police “underequipped for the situation.”
Minutes before Mr. Kessler was scheduled to address the media on Sunday, the brick mall behind City Hall was packed with at least two dozen television cameras. Two uniformed officers, one armed with a sniper rifle, could be seen on the roof of a nearby building. A bouquet of flowers tied with a black ribbon lay in front of the City Hall doors.
When Mr. Kessler appeared, the crowed that had assembled called him a “murderer” and a “terrorist,” drowning out his words with cries of “shame, shame.”
The press conference ended when a man in a plaid shirt punched Mr. Kessler. Although the police detained him briefly, he was not arrested.
“Jason Kessler has been bringing hate to our town for months and has been endangering the lives of people of color and endangering other lives in my community,” the man, Jeff Winder, said in an interview later. “Free speech does not protect hate speech; Kessler’s rhetoric is fire in a crowded theater.”
The organizers of the Unite the Right rally had obtained a city permit to gather inside Emancipation Park around a statue of Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general. The park was barricaded off for the day and the Virginia State Police and the Charlottesville police were positioned inside when fighting first broke out on Market Street, outside the park.
Brittany Caine-Conley, a minister in training at Sojourners United Church of Christ, who had come with other faith leaders to protest against the white nationalists, said she was horrified to see officers in the park watching the violence take place outside in the street.
“There was no police presence,’’ she said. “We were watching people punch each other; people were bleeding all the while police were inside of barricades at the park watching. It was essentially just brawling on the street and community members trying to protect each other.”
Asked about the brawling and why police did not do more to control it, Brian Moran, Virginia’s secretary of public safety, said in an interview on Sunday that “it was a volatile situation and it’s unfortunate people resorted to violence.’’ But, he said, “From our plan, to ensure the safety of our citizens and property, it went extremely well.’’
Governor McAuliffe also defended the police response, saying, “It’s easy to criticize, but I can tell you this, 80 percent of the people here had semiautomatic weapons.
“You saw the militia walking down the street, you would have thought they were an army,” he added. “I was just talking to the State Police upstairs; they had better equipment than our State Police had,” he said, referring to the militia members. “And yet not a shot was fired, zero property damage.”
The governor’s remarks came after he met with law enforcement officials in a bank building on Charlottesville’s downtown mall. The mall, like the rest of the city, was quiet as people absorbed the violence that had descended on this ordinarily tranquil college community. People on the mall seemed to be in shock.
“There are no words,” said Chuck Moran, a Charlottesville native who runs a digital marketing agency. “We’ve been through a lot in this city. We have a historic past. But yesterday was a tragedy of unimaginable proportion to me.”
Home to the University of Virginia, which was founded by Thomas Jefferson in 1819, Charlottesville has become a target of white nationalists, who came to the city to protest the planned removal of a statue of General Lee from a city park.
The Unite the Right rally was scheduled to start at noon, but when violent clashes erupted between the two sides at around 11 a.m., the police declared an unlawful assembly and moved to clear the park so that officers in riot gear could move in.
“The police moved when they felt it was appropriate,” Governor McAuliffe said. “They had to give people an opportunity to clear out of the park so they sent the word first, before we come in.”
Hurt and Angry, Charlottesville Tries to Regroup
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERGCHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — Brittany Caine-Conley, a minister in training at Sojourners United Church of Christ, arrived in downtown Charlottesville on Saturday morning expecting that there might be violence. She did not expect things to get out of hand so quickly.
But what began as a rally of white nationalists in a city park soon spun out of control, resulting in melees in the streets and the death of a 32-year-old woman after a car rammed a group of counterprotesters. The police have charged a 20-year-old Ohio man described as a Nazi sympathizer, accusing him of intentionally driving his car into the crowd.
On Sunday, Charlottesville tried to recover — as the police, in particular, came in for criticism.
At church services, pastors urged their congregations to fill their lives with love, not hate — a message echoed by Gov. Terry McAuliffe. The downtown mall, a pretty pedestrian plaza, was unusually quiet. People looked grief-stricken, as State Police officers in riot gear sat on a brick wall, taking a break in the midday sun.
At Emancipation Park, where the so-called Unite the Right rally had been planned for Saturday around a statue of the Confederate general Robert E. Lee, city workers picked up trash. On Water Street, where the authorities say the man from Ohio, James Alex Fields Jr., 20, took the life of Heather D. Heyer, 32, an impromptu memorial of flowers lay in the middle of the road.
And at City Hall, a planned news conference by Jason Kessler, the white nationalist who organized Saturday’s rally, came to an abrupt end when a man wearing a plaid shirt punched him.
“Jason Kessler has been bringing hate to our town for months and has been endangering the lives of people of color and endangering other lives in my community,” the man, Jeff Winder, said in an interview later. “Free speech does not protect hate speech.”
But if Charlottesville was grieving on Sunday, it was also questioning. Governor McAuliffe fiercely defended the police in an impromptu sidewalk interview, noting that many of the demonstrators were armed, and saying the officers had done “great work” in a “very delicate situation.” And he said Ms. Heyer’s death, which he called “car terrorism,” could not have been prevented.
“You can’t stop some crazy guy who came here from Ohio and used his car as a weapon,” Governor McAuliffe said. “He is a terrorist.”
But others, including Mr. Kessler and Ms. Caine-Conley, openly wondered if the violence could have been prevented.
“There was no police presence,” Ms. Caine-Conley said. “We were watching people punch each other; people were bleeding all the while police were inside of barricades at the park, watching. It was essentially just brawling on the street and community members trying to protect each other.”
Many cities, among them St. Louis and New Orleans, have wrestled with what to do about Confederate monuments. Like them, Charlottesville — the home of the University of Virginia, founded by Thomas Jefferson in 1819 — has been navigating tricky terrain. As Mayor Mike Signer asked in an interview Sunday, “How do you reconcile public safety and the First Amendment?”
Saturday was not the first time that white nationalists and white supremacists had rallied in Charlottesville. In May, Richard Spencer, a prominent white nationalist and a graduate of the University of Virginia, led a torch-lit rally here, and last month, the Ku Klux Klan came from North Carolina.
Sensing there might be trouble, the city tried to deny Mr. Kessler’s group a permit for Emancipation Park; officials wanted the gathering in a larger park, where they felt they could better control the crowd. But on Friday evening, a judge sided with Mr. Kessler. Mayor Signer would later lament on Twitter that it was a fateful turn of events.
“This is EXACTLY why City tried to change venue to McIntire,” he wrote.
On Saturday morning at sunrise, faith leaders and scores of counterprotesters — some from the Black Lives Matter movement, others from groups like Showing Up for Racial Justice — gathered at First Baptist Church, a historically African-American church here. Around 8 a.m., they started massing for a march downtown, toward Emancipation Park.
Across town, the white nationalists were gathering for their own trek to Emancipation Park, for a rally that was not supposed to begin until noon. “I’m tired of seeing white people pushed around,” said one man, Ted, who refused to give his last name.
By the time both groups converged on the park, a line of camouflage-clad militia members toting assault rifles were standing outside the park, looking very much like an invading army. “They had better equipment than our State Police had,” Mr. McAuliffe said.
As the white nationalists massed in the park, Ms. Caine-Conley and other members of the clergy locked arms in the street. Behind them were hundreds of protesters, including black-clad, helmet-wearing members of the far left known as antifa.
Brian Moran, Virginia’s secretary of public safety and homeland security, was watching the events from a command post on the sixth floor of a Wells Fargo bank on the downtown mall. There were sporadic fights. “I compare it to hockey,” he said. “Often in hockey there are sporadic fights, and then they separate.”
Suddenly, people were throwing water bottles, some filled with urine. Some used pepper spray; from his perch on the sixth floor, Mr. Moran saw smoke bombs being thrown. People started clubbing one another. The clergy retreated to a “safe house” — a restaurant nearby.
But according to many witnesses, the police waited to intervene. Ms. Caine-Conley called it “fascinating and appalling.”
Mr. Kessler, too, complained.
In a statement, he said the authorities had “exacerbated the violence” by failing to separate his followers from counterprotesters. He said his group had “networked with law enforcement officials” months ago on a plan for maintaining safety, which he said was not followed, and he called the police “underequipped for the situation.”
At 11:22 a.m. Mr. Moran called the governor and asked him to declare a state of emergency. Mr. McAuliffe did so. Asked why the police did not do more to control the brawling, Mr. Moran said, “It was a volatile situation and it’s unfortunate people resorted to violence.”
“But,” he said, “from our plan, to ensure the safety of our citizens and property, it went extremely well.”
Corinne Geller, a spokeswoman for the State Police, said, “It may have looked like a lot of our folks were standing around,” because of the sheer number of officers on the scene, but “there were other troopers and law enforcement officers who were responding to incidents as they arose.”
The moment the emergency was declared, police officers started announcing on loudspeakers that the gathering was an unlawful assembly, and called for the crowd to disperse, cutting off the rally before it officially began. Both Mr. Moran and Mr. McAuliffe said the police needed time to get the demonstrators out of the park, and off the streets, before riot police officers could move in.
As the riot police pushed protesters back, Ms. Caine-Conley and her fellow clergy members were regrouping inside the restaurant. Suddenly, a woman rushed in, screaming that there had been a terrible car crash on Water Street nearby.
“There were bodies everywhere,” said the Rev. Seth Wispelwey of Sojourners United Church of Christ, who rushed to the scene. “There was blood and glass all over the street.”
Mr. Fields, who the authorities say was driving the car, has been charged with second-degree murder. He served briefly in the Army, military records show; a former high school teacher of his in Kentucky said that when Mr. Fields was a freshman, he wrote a report for a class “very much along the party lines of the neo-Nazi movement.”
The woman who was killed, Ms. Heyer, worked as a paralegal and was known as a strong, sensitive woman who stood up against “any type of discrimination,” her supervisor said.
The Justice Department has opened a civil rights investigation.
On Sunday, as people tried to make sense of it all, a vigil for Ms. Heyer was canceled, its organizers said, because of the threat or rumor of more white nationalist activity. Still, people here wanted the nation to know that this was not the Charlottesville they knew and loved. Heather Hutton’s blue eyes filled with tears as she walked away from the memorial to Ms. Heyer.
“It just hurts,” Ms. Hutton, 52, said, wiping the tears away. “It hurts us all as a town.”
As you already knew, The New York Times is scum.
Hat tip: BadBlue Real-Time News.
There is a Jeff Winder of the Wayside Center For Popular Education who punched the organizer of the original nationalist march in the face during a press conference.He was not arrested for that violent act.He preaches that he opposed the march as it might get people hurt.Let's not just decry the violent killing of the woman at the counter protest,but those on both sides of the protest/counter protest who were manhandled and mistreated.Including anyone who ran afoul of violent Soros-funded people like Jeff Winder of the far leftist Wayside Center For Popular Education.I'm checking their funding sources now,and they look suspiciously Soros-y so far.
ReplyDeleteIt's amazing how little power conservatives have with all three branches.
ReplyDeleteNo wonder the left call us idiots.
Obama is a perm in Washington.
He deserves America and if we keep allowing it, then yes, we sure as f deserve him... and soros. Whites are the new jews and they hoist the petard with the applomb of cowardly idiots.