What exactly did Donald Trump say about "good people on both sides" after Charlottesville?
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Executive summary
Donald Trump said at a Trump Tower news conference that “you also had some very fine people on both sides” while defending his earlier “blame on both sides” formulation about the August 2017 Charlottesville clashes — a remark widely quoted and transcribed in multiple news outlets and context checks [1] [2]. He repeated the “both sides” argument in later interviews and statements, framing counter-protesters (which he labeled “alt‑left” or Antifa) as also culpable; Congress then passed a resolution condemning white supremacists and related groups which Trump signed [3] [4].
1. The precise words Trump used — and where they came from
At a press appearance on Aug. 15, 2017, Trump reiterated that “I think there is blame on both sides… You had some very bad people in that group. You also had some very fine people on both sides,” language captured in contemporaneous transcripts and reporting [1] [2]. PolitiFact assembled the exchange and places Trump’s “very fine people” line in the final third of that transcript [1].
2. How news outlets and fact‑checkers framed the line
Major outlets quoted the sentence verbatim and reported the immediate backlash; ABC News headlined the quote and explained Trump used it to justify blaming both the white supremacist marchers and counter‑protesters [2]. Fact‑check and context pieces — including PolitiFact and Snopes — confirm he said those words while also noting he separately condemned neo‑Nazis and white nationalists in other remarks [1] [5].
3. Political and public fallout: why the phrase mattered
The phrase was widely interpreted as creating a moral equivalence between far‑right demonstrators and those opposing them; that interpretation triggered bipartisan criticism and resignations from advisory councils, and contributed to a poll showing a plurality of Americans disapproved of Trump’s handling of Charlottesville [6]. News coverage emphasized that critics saw the comment as a false equivalence given the presence of explicit white‑supremacist ideology among the marchers [6].
4. Trump’s stated intent and later defenses
Trump and some conservative commentators have defended the line as referring to non‑extremist people who came to protest a statue rather than to the neo‑Nazi and white‑supremacist elements, and have pointed to his separate condemnations of white supremacists [7] [5]. Reporting shows he later reiterated the “both sides” theme in other contexts, invoking “Antifa” as an example of violent counter‑protesters [3] [4].
5. What congressional and institutional responses did
After the events and the president’s remarks, Congress passed a resolution “rejecting white nationalists, white supremacists, the Ku Klux Klan, neo‑Nazis, and other hate groups,” which the president signed; news outlets recorded that sequence in coverage [3]. Several members of his advisory councils resigned citing concern about his response to Charlottesville among their reasons [6].
6. Competing interpretations and who benefits
Supporters argue the precise quotation has been distorted and stress Trump’s explicit condemnations of neo‑Nazis elsewhere; critics argue the “very fine people” line still functioned as a public equivocation that mainstreamed or softened the rebuke of white supremacists [7] [5]. Political actors on both sides used the episode: opponents framed it as proof of moral failure; allies used fact‑checks that emphasize his condemnations to rebut those criticisms [7] [8].
7. Limits of available reporting and unresolved questions
Available sources do not provide definitive evidence that Trump intended to praise neo‑Nazis as a group; reporting documents his words and the broader context but leaves interpretation contested between critics, allies, and fact‑checkers [1] [5]. Sources do not settle whether individual listeners uniformly heard “very fine people” as praise for extremists versus a narrower reference to non‑extremist protesters [1] [2].
Bottom line: the textual record shows Trump did say “you also had some very fine people on both sides” at the Aug. 15, 2017 press conference and repeated a “both sides” framing in subsequent comments; how to interpret whether that constituted praise, equivocation, or a narrowly targeted observation remains disputed across news reports, fact checks, and political voices [1] [2] [5] [3].