7/15/2019

RACISM/TRUMP PEOPLE: “When President Trump defended neo-Nazi protesters in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017, one of his top aides took the rare step of publicly condemning what he said. Gary D. Cohn, who served as his top economic adviser at the time, said in an interview with The Financial Times that ‘this administration can and must do better in consistently and unequivocally condemning these groups.’ On Monday [7-15-19], Mr. Cohn’s successor in the West Wing, Larry Kudlow, steered clear of the latest flare-up of Mr. Trump’s inflammatory language…Almost two years after Charlottesville, when Mr. Trump refused to condemn white supremacists after their deadly clash with a crowd protesting them, presidential statements widely condemned as racist are still putting White House officials in the awkward position of having to defend comments they privately wish Mr. Trump had not made. But they are also causing less heartburn in the West Wing than they used to.”

Annie Karni, “Trump’s Aides, Not Eager to Defend His Tweets, Also Don’t Condemn Them,” The New York Times online, July 15, 2019