{"id":419,"date":"2017-08-14T13:54:04","date_gmt":"2017-08-14T17:54:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=419"},"modified":"2018-03-03T14:09:41","modified_gmt":"2018-03-03T19:09:41","slug":"recounting-a-day-of-rage-hate-violence-and-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=419","title":{"rendered":"Recounting a day of rage, hate, violence and death"},"content":{"rendered":"

How a rally of white nationalists and supremacists at the University of Virginia turned into a \u201ctragic, tragic weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n

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By Joe Heim
\nAug. 14, 2017
\nCHARLOTTESVILLE \u2014 Rumors circulated all week. Details were scant. No time or place was certain, but the word was that white nationalists and supremacists coming to town for Saturday\u2019s Unite the Right rally had a Friday night surprise. They were going to march in a torchlight procession \u2014 a symbolic gathering meant to evoke similar marches of Hitler Youth and other ultraright nationalist organizations of the past century.<\/p>\n

A little after 8 p.m., Richard Spencer, a leader of far-right white nationalists and a scheduled headline speaker at the Saturday rally, texted a reporter.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d be near campus tonight, if I were you,\u201d he wrote. \u201cAfter 9 p.m. Nameless field.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rumor was true. The torchlight parade was on. It would prove to be the catalyst for a horrific 24 hours in this usually quiet college town that would come to be seen by the nation and world as a day of racial rage, hate, violence and death.<\/p>\n

When it was over, questions about how this could happen centered on three groups: a meticulously organized, well coordinated and heavily armed company of white nationalists; a fiercely resistant and determined group of counterprotesters prepared to stop the Saturday rally; and state and local authorities who seemed caught off guard by the boldness and persistence of both groups.<\/p>\n

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By 8:45 p.m. Friday, a column of about 250 mostly young white males, many wearing khaki pants and white polo shirts, began to stretch across the shadowy Nameless Field, a large expanse of grass behind Memorial Gymnasium at the University of Virginia. Their torches, filled with kerosene by workers at a nearby table, were still dark.<\/p>\n

\u201cStay in formation!\u201d barked an organizer carrying a bullhorn. \u201cTwo by two! Two by two!\u201d<\/p>\n

Within minutes, marchers lit their torches. Additional organizers, wearing earpieces and carrying radios, ran up and down the line shouting directions.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow! Now! Go!\u201d<\/p>\n

The marchers took off at a brisk pace and immediately began yelling slogans: \u201cBlood and soil!\u201d \u201cYou will not replace us!\u201d \u201cJews will not replace us!\u201d<\/p>\n