Trump On Charlottesville: "Very Fine People" (2017) [Archive Favorite]

This Day

Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia

History

4.6 • 982 Ratings

🗓️ 12 August 2025

⏱️ 29 minutes

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Summary

It's August 15th. This day in 2017, President Donald Trump gave a press conference in which he offered remarks about the violence that took place in Charlottesville, VA a couple days before.

Jody, NIki, and Kellie discuss the roots of the white supremacist rallies and violence in Charlottesville, as well as Trump's comments that there were "very fine people on both sides." Those comments have since been contested and decontextualized by his supporters.

If you want a deeper dive on the Unite The Right rally, check out Niki's six-part podcast A12.

Don't forget to sign up for our America250 Watch newsletter, where you'll also get links and lots more historical tidbits.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey there, Jody here from This Day headquarters.
0:05.5	We are taking our usual late summer break.
0:08.0	So for the next couple weeks, we are bringing you some favorites from the archives.
0:12.2	Maybe you've heard them before.
0:13.3	Maybe you haven't.
0:14.1	Either way, we think these are worth spending some time with.
0:16.4	And thanks to everyone who subscribes to our newsletter who helped vote on which episodes to rerun.
0:22.2	This is a gentle reminder to subscribe to the newsletter.
0:25.0	Also spread the word about the show to someone, leave a review, get in touch with an idea for an episode at thisdaypod.com,
0:30.9	and most importantly, enjoy the last few weeks of summer.
0:34.7	All right, here we go.
0:40.9	Hello and welcome to This Day in esoteric political history from Radiotopia. My name is Jody Avergan. This day, August 15th, 2017.
0:51.1	President Donald Trump gives a press conference in which he has pushed to offer remarks about
0:55.5	the protests and violence that had taken place in Charlottesville, Virginia a few days earlier.
1:00.9	Charlottesville was the site of the so-called Unite the Right rally where groups of white supremacists
1:06.0	marched ostensibly in support of protests over the fate of a Robert E. Lee statue, but the march turned
1:12.1	into much more than that. I'm sure listeners will remember this, but this was the Tiki torches,
1:16.9	the chance of things like Jews will not replace us, the proud boys, the alt-right, neo-Nazis,
1:22.7	KKK, we're all in the mix, as well as counter-protesters. And we will go through a little bit of that day
1:28.8	in the aftermath, the counter-protesters, the violence, the woman who was killed, and of course
1:33.5	Trump's reaction, both on the day of and on this day, August 15th, when, among other things,
1:39.8	he uttered that phrase about there being, quote, very fine people on both sides of these protests.
	...

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