An alt-right protest led by a known white supremacist arrived in Washington D.C. this morning, but the 25-or-so goons leading the charge were met by thousands upon thousands of counter-protesters.
Members of the Unite The Right 2 rally converged on Lafayette Square in America‘s capital where they were easily outnumbered by police and regular folks who don’t believe that blatantly racist agitators should be allowed to roam the streets unchallenged.
Reporters on the scene stated the group, led by self-described “white civil rights activist” Jason Kessler, was both surprisingly small – and unsurprisingly heckled from the moment they limped out of a nearby subway station.
https://twitter.com/mike_giglio/status/1028731360435990529
Can’t stress enough how underwhelming the #UniteTheRight2 #unitetheright group is. Twenty MAGA dudes walking inside of 100s of cops, 100s of media, and 1000s of counter demonstrators down F street pic.twitter.com/BQZBpn9oME
— Scott Heins (@scottheins) August 12, 2018
This is the “Unite the Right”’rally crowd. All of them. pic.twitter.com/flgi9jqZQ2
— Garrett Haake (@GarrettHaake) August 12, 2018
https://twitter.com/hannah_natanson/status/1028727225829519360
Counter-protesters included members of the Black Lives Matter movement, antifa factions, and unaffiliated citizens who just didn’t like the idea of white nationalists roaming in front of the White House without opposition.
A BLM group has arrived here on the corner of 17th & Penn as well, and the two appear to be joining up for a combined protest. They’re not talking to press. pic.twitter.com/asm1nEqpZu
— Garrett Haake (@GarrettHaake) August 12, 2018
https://twitter.com/Lemon_Wizard/status/1028735752832774146
The rally came a year to the day after the first Unite The Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where counter-protester Heather Heyer was run over and killed by an avowed Nazi sympathiser.
That rally marked a turning point in U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration. Instead of immediately damning the ideology which led to Heyer’s death, Trump said there were “very fine people, on both sides.”
Many took that as implicit support of the movement, which has traditionally hewed towards supporting Trump’s political agenda.
Trump tweeted this out before the latest rally:
The riots in Charlottesville a year ago resulted in senseless death and division. We must come together as a nation. I condemn all types of racism and acts of violence. Peace to ALL Americans!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 11, 2018
It’s yet to be seen if he further condemns the latest stragglers – but it’s not looking likely.
