Fremont residents rally against racism

FREMONT - Residents spoke out against racism and hate at a rally in Fremont following the weekend attack in Charlottesville, and also questioned President Donald Trump's response to the violence in Virginia that resulted in one death and multiple injuries.

The Charlottesville Solidary Rally took place Wednesday afternoon at the corner of Front and State streets, with about 20 protesters holding signs and waving to passing motorists.

"I think racism is a mental illness," said Audrey Young of Fremont, as she held a sign that read "Black Lives Matter" and denounced Trump's assertion that "both sides" were to blame for the violence that occurred after a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville on Saturday.

Young said she came out to protest hate and white supremacy groups and what she viewed as the president's siding with neo-Nazis and domestic terrorist groups in the aftermath of the Virginia violence.

"This makes me feel like this is not my country," Young said.

James Alex Fields, Jr., 20, who moved from Kentucky to Maumee about a year ago, is accused of killing one and injuring 19 in Saturday's attack.

He has been charged with second-degree murder, three counts of malicious wounding and failure to stop in an accident that resulted in death.

Authorities say Fields drove his 2010 Dodge Challenger through a crowd of counter-protesters following a white supremacist rally, smashing into two other vehicles and throwing several victims into the air.

Killed was Heather Heyer, 32, of Charlottesville.

Trump initially said there was blame on "many sides" for the Charlottesville violence, then on Monday denounced the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis. On Tuesday, Trump said "alt-left" counter-protesters were also to blame, and that some "very fine people" were demonstrating on both sides in Charlottesville.

The tragic events in Charlottesville represented a moral breaking point for Molly Hull, as the Fremont resident blasted Trump for what she described as his scapegoating of certain religious and political groups.

"There's no moral equivalency," Hull said of Saturday's violence.

Josie Setzler of Fremont organized the rally.

She said she couldn't get out of her head the violent images of white supremacists carrying torches and chanting hate-filled slogans.

"To think the people would be embracing Nazism in this country at this moment is horrifying," Setzler said.

Karin Brown stood next to Setzler and held a sign that read "Never Again."

Brown grew up in Germany, married an American serviceman and became an American citizen in the 1970s.

She said her native country did not allow the public display of swastikas and Nazi-related imagery.

Her relatives in Germany were outraged at the recent violence and couldn't understand why it was happening in America, Brown said.

"We're allowing history to be repeated," Brown said.

dacarson@gannett.com

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Twitter: @DanielCarson7