Speaking on Night Three of the Republican National Convention on Wednesday, former NFL player Jack Brewer blasted the media narrative that Donald Trump once called white supremacists “very fine people.”
The narrative Brewer addressed involves Trump’s response to the infamous Charlottesville Unite the Right Rally in 2017.
Some protesters at the rally were protesting the removal of a statue, while others were members of antifa, neo-Nazis and white supremacists.
Although the White House transcript of Trump’s remarks revealed that the president fully condemned all of the white supremacists present, the media and Joe Biden have addressed those comments as though Trump was calling the white supremacists themselves “very fine people.”
Brewer addressed the Charlottesville comments and the media coverage of them. He was speaking at the RNC despite being removed from the list of speakers due to recent insider trading charges, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.
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He began by pleading with the American people to stop letting their distaste for Trump blind them from seeing the truth.
“At some point, for the sake of our children, the policies must take priority over the personalities,” Brewer said. “So because you have an issue with President Trump’s tone, you’re going to allow Biden and Harris to deny our underserved black and brown children school choice?”
“Are we so offended by the president’s campaign slogan ‘Make America Great Again’ that we’re going to ignore that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have collectively been responsible for locking up countless black men for non-violent crimes?”
Brewer then blasted the media for its coverage of Charlottesville.
“Are you going to allow the media to lie to you by falsely claiming that he said there are ‘very fine’ white supremacists in Charlottesville?” Brewer asked.
“He didn’t say that. It’s a lie.”
On August 12, Biden disseminated the false narrative on Twitter.
Three years ago today, white supremacists descended on Charlottesville with torches in hand and hate in their hearts. Our president said they were “very fine people.”
It was clear then, and it’s clear now: We are in a battle for the soul of our nation, and we must win.
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 12, 2020
“Three years ago today, white supremacists descended on Charlottesville with torches in hand and hate in their hearts. Our president said they were ‘very fine people,’” Biden wrote.
“It was clear then, and it’s clear now: We are in a battle for the soul of our nation, and we must win.”
A closer look at the White House transcript of Trump’s comments reveal that he did, in fact, denounce the white supremacists in Charlottesville.
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“You had some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides,” Trump said then. “You had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down of, to them, a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name.
“And you had people — and I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists — because they should be condemned totally. But you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists. OK? And the press has treated them absolutely unfairly.”
When asked if he meant the media was treating white nationalists unfairly, Trump further clarified he in no way supported their actions.
“No, no. There were people in that rally — and I looked the night before — if you look, there were people protesting very quietly the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. I’m sure in that group there were some bad ones. The following day it looked like they had some rough, bad people — neo-Nazis, white nationalists, whatever you want to call them,” Trump explained.
“But you had a lot of people in that group that were there to innocently protest, and very legally protest — because I don’t know if you know, they had a permit. The other group didn’t have a permit. So I only tell you this: There are two sides to a story. I thought what took place was a horrible moment for our country — a horrible moment. But there are two sides to the country.”
The Charlottesville lie surfaced again last week at the Democratic National Convention, when Biden — echoing his tweet from a few days earlier — repeated the falsehood in a speech.
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