Florida Gov. Rick Scott and Attorney General Pam Bondi, both strong supporters of President Donald Trump, decried racism and groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis as reverberations continued Wednesday across the country after a deadly weekend in Charlottesville, Va.
“I served in the Navy. My dad served in the Second World War,” Scott said. “I didn't serve to defend neo-Nazis.”
Bondi, meanwhile, expressed support for a decision Wednesday by University of Florida President Kent Fuchs to deny a request to allow white nationalist leader Richard Spencer to speak on the Gainesville campus next month. Fuchs pointed to safety concerns.
“Of course, we all believe in the First Amendment, but his priority as president of the University of Florida is to protect the students that go to that school,” Bondi said. “That's why I think that's very important.”
Scott and Bondi, however, kept their distance from a controversy about statements Trump made after members of the “alt-right” rallied in Charlottesville, leading to clashes with counter-protesters.
The governor said he was disgusted by what took place in Charlottesville and said a white supremacist “murdered” a woman by driving a car into a crowd of counter-protesters. Scott noted that the woman, Heather Heyer, 32, was about the same age as one of his daughters.
