The National Bar Association Young Lawyers Division mourns with the city of Charlottesvillle, Virginia in the wake of the violent white nationalist “Unite the Right” rally on Saturday that resulted in the deaths of Charlottesville resident Heather Heyer and Lieutenant H. Jay Cullen and Trooper-Pilot Berke M.M. Bates of the Virginia State Police.
We must call evil by its name. Yesterday’s attack in Charlottesville was an act of domestic terrorism. The YLD is deeply disappointed in President’s Trump’s public statement following the attack in which he alludes to shared blame between protesters and counter-protesters and condemns “violence on many sides. On many sides” without any specific condemnation of the vehicular attack nor any specific mention of the gun- and torch-wielding white nationalists, white supremacists, neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members whose hateful demonstration caused the deaths of three people and the injury of several others. Now is not the time for vague calls for unity. Now is not the time to exhibit neutrality toward hate speech. Now more than ever, the American public needs to hear directly from the President — not a surrogate or unnamed spokesperson — that he condemns both the acts of domestic terrorism committed in Virginia and the hateful views of the groups behind such terrorism. Any response short of that specificity is woefully inadequate.
The YLD seeks swift justice for those injured and killed on Saturday. We support Charlottesville Mayor Michael Signer in calling upon the Department of Justice to swiftly investigate and prosecute the attack as a case of domestic terrorism. With equal exigency, we urge President Trump to firmly and unequivocally take a “side” against the hate groups responsible.
Roxana S. Bell, Chair
Young Lawyers Division
National Bar Association
