The teen vigilante from the Kenosha protest, Kyle Rittenhouse, was defended by President Donald Trump himself on the eve before his visit.
There have been doubts and concerns about President Trump’s visit to Kenosha, but he still went ahead with it. On the eve before his visit, he expressed his insight on the incident that happened on the third night of protest in the city.
As previously reported, Rittenhouse traveled all the way from Antioch, Illinois to Kenosha with a semi-automatic rifle. Reports confirm that he went to the city to act as an armed vigilante, which resulted in him killing two people and one left injured.
Trump echoes lawyer’s defense
The 17-year-old’s lawyer has previously expressed that the teen was acting in self-defense. It was seen in many videos posted online that after shooting one person, he was chased down by other people in the area.
Trump told reporters on Monday that he saw the video of the incident and he said, Rittenhouse was “trying to get away from them, I guess, it looks like,” per USA Today. He further narrated that when the teen fell, the protestors “violently attacked him.”
The president further added:
“I guess he was in very big trouble. He would have been, he probably would have been killed. But it’s under – it’s under investigation.”
Comparison in “peaceful protest”
Meanwhile, Washington Post highlighted a comparison of the president’s condemnation against violence in protests, when a person shot a Trump supporter in Portland.
“Well, I understand that had large numbers of people that were supporters, but that was a peaceful protest,” the publication quotes. “And paint is not — and paint as a defensive mechanism, paint is not bullets. … These people, they protested peacefully. They went in very peacefully.”
It should be noted that during his RNC acceptance speech, Trump slammed “peaceful demonstrators.” He echoed the same during his Kenosha visit, saying, “These are not acts of peaceful protest, but really domestic terror.”
On the day of the Portland shooting, the pro-Trump rally slipped through the downtown core and clashed with the BLM demonstrators. Amid the fistfight, paintball shooting, and some kind of mace spraying, people heard two gunshots and saw Aaron Danielson, also known as Jay Bishop, fall dead.
Trump describes an “anti-fascist” individual who “shot a young gentleman and killed him — not with paint, but with a bullet. And I think it’s disgraceful.”
"That was a peaceful protest," Trump said. "Paint is not bullets."
Trump opts not to condemn his own supporters in Portland, where they were seen shooting paintballs at protesters.
— Eli Stokols (@EliStokols) August 31, 2020
Moreover, Rittenhouse is facing “five felonies and a misdemeanor.” While a man by the name of Michael Reinoehl is reportedly being investigated for the Portland shooting, per The Wall Street Journal.
Featured image courtesy of Gage Skidmore/Flickr