https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/05/08/very-fine-people-charlottesville-who-were-they-2/
Fact Checker Analysis
The ‘very fine people’ at Charlottesville: Who were they?
May 8, 2020
....This is where Trump got into trouble. While he condemned right-wing hate groups — “those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups that are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans” — he appeared to believe there were peaceful protesters there as well.
“You had people — and I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists — because they should be condemned totally,” Trump said on Aug. 15, several days after the rally. “But you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists.”
He added: “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 Pinocchio Test
The evidence shows there were no quiet protesters against removing the statue that weekend. That’s just a figment of the president’s imagination. The militia groups were not spurred on by the Confederate statue controversy. They arrived in Charlottesville heavily armed and, by their own account, were prepared to use deadly force — because of a desire to insert themselves in a dangerous situation that, in effect, pitted them against the foes of white supremacists.
Trump earns Four Pinocchios.