Robert E. Lee statue removed in Charlottesville
Robert E. Lee #RobertE.Lee
A statue honoring Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was removed Saturday, nearly four years after white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups stormed the Virginia college town to protect it.
Crews were also expected to take down a statue of Gen. Stonewall Jackson.
“Taking down this statue is one small step closer to the goal of helping Charlottesville, Virginia, and America, grapple with the sin of being willing to destroy Black people for economic gain,” Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker told reporters and observers in a speech near the monument.
The statues will be stored until the City Council decides to sell, destroy or otherwise dispose of them. Under state law, the city was required to solicit parties interested in taking the statues during an offer period that ended Thursday. It received 10 responses to its solicitation.
White supremacist and neo-Nazi groups descended on Charlottesville in August 2017 for a violent “Unite the Right” rally to protest efforts to remove monuments to those infamous 19th century military leaders.
The protests turned deadly after James Alex Fields Jr. killed 32-year-old paralegal and civil rights activist Heather Heyer.
Fields, an Ohio man known for being fascinated with Nazism and idolizing Adolf Hitler, drove his car into a group of counter protesters. He’s now serving a life sentence.
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