The president s tough talk on north korea. It started here. They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen. Went to here. If anything, maybe that statement wasnt tough enough. And landed here. If he utters one threat, he will truly regret it. And he will regret it fast. Is it all bluster . Or a necessary warning to a rogue nation with nuclear weapons. I will ask National Security master h. R. Mcmaster and admiral mike mullen. Joining me with joy reid, richard lowry, amy walter, and helene cooper, pentagon correspondent for the new york times. Welcome to sunday, its meet the press. Announcer celebrating its 70th year, this is meet the press with chuck todd. Good sunday morning. In the opening months of his presidency, many of us wondered how President Trump would respond to the crisis when the nation looks to its president. Could he lead . Could he inspire . Could he heal . He didnt have one test this week, he has had two. We will get to the north korea situation later. Yesterday, we received another reminder how volatile extremism can be in america. Clashes broke out in charlottesville, virginia, between White Nationalist protesting the removal of a robert e. Lee statue and counterprotesters. After the governor declared a state of emergency, a car plowed into a crowd of counterprotesters, killing one person and injuring 19 others. The fbi has opened a civil rights investigation into the incident, adding to a tragic day, a chopper carrying two Virginia StatePolice Officers who were hovering over the air monitoring the violence crashed a few miles outside of the city. Both officers were killed. Here is how charlottesville city manager reacted to the violence. Hate came to our town today. In a way that we feared but we had never really let ourselves imagine would. Tom costello is on the ground in charlottesville this morning. Tom, i take it a lot more calm this morning than there has been the last 48 hours. Reporter yeah. Good morning. Thats the statue of robert e. Lee. Its emancipation park, no longer lee park. This is where the white sue supremacists came yesterday. We have the identity of the woman killed, 32yearold heather higher was killed. We have a name of the suspect who has been arrested, 20yearold alex fields of ohio, charged with Second Degree murder, three counts of malicious wounding, one count of hit and run. He will be in court tomorrow. Three more people arrested as well, charged with disorderly conduct, misdemeanor assault, battery, carrying a concealed weapon. This got out of hand very, very quickly. This morning, peace in charlottesville and a very heavy police presence. I will talk to the mayor in a minute here. Theres been some folks there questioning the Police Response yesterday. Did they stand back too much . There was there were times when you were watching the video that we saw a lot of armed people but those werent police. Who were they . Reporter whats interesting is that some of the White Nationalists and neonazis and kkk members apparently came here armed and prepared for battle. They were dressed in this almost paramilitary garb, if you will. They had body armor on. Some veterans of the military say that some of that looks like it came out of the military. Also, they were wearing helmets. They had shields, clubs. Some of them were actually carrying weapons. Keep in mind, this is an open carry state. So they came into this in a very intimidating fashion. They were met with counterprotesters who were determined not to allow those White Nationalists to gain any momentum in the town. As a result, we had the clash literately where im standing. The street is covered in dye and paint. They have had broken battles and cans all over the streets. They have been picking that up today. It does appear that those individuals, those White Supremacists left town yesterday. They seem to have scattered. We dont know where they went. We presume they went back to their homes, wherever that might be. The locals here say that they didnt recognize any of those White Supremacists as locals. They believe they all came from out of state or many of them from out of state. Tom costello on the ground for us, thanks very much. Shortly after the violence in charlottesville broke out, President Trump tweeted, we all must be united and condemn all that hate stands for. Theres no place for this kind of violence in america. Lets come together as one. It was what the president said later in the day or more to the point what he didnt say or even tweet that is getting by far the most attention. The president s comments and the sharp reaction to them put a political coda on the day for the violence we saw unfold yesterday. The pedestrians, its the most horrific thing. Tragedy and violence, a 32yearold woman killed and 19 injured. A car accelerated into a crowd of counter demonstrators. Police arrested james alex fields of ohio and charged him with one count of Second Degree murder. Hours later, two state Police Officers assisting with Public Safety died whether their helicopter crashed. The deaths were painful end to a violent day. White nationalists, many carrying weapons, holding nazi symbols clashed with counterprotesters. Over the past several weeks, mr. Trump condemned his partys leader in the senate, Mitch Mcconnell, members of congress and his own attorney general. The president s response to White Supremacists was tepid by comparison. We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides, on many sides. Asked to clarify an Unnamed White House official told nbc news, the president was condemning hatred, bigotry between all. Do you want the support of the White Nationalist groups who say they support you, mr. President . Have you denounced them strongly enough . As some of the White Nationalists cited trumps victory for their belief. We will fulfill the promises of donald trump. Thats what we believed in. Thats what we voted for. Mr. Trump chose not to condemn them. Many elected republicans seem to agree the president did not go far enough. Colorado senator cory gardner, who is in charge of Getting Senate republicans elected in 2018 tweeted, mr. President , we must call evil by its name. These were White Supremacists and this was domestic terrorism. Floors marco rubio quote, very important for the nation to hear potus describe events in charlottesville for what they are, a terror attack by White Supremacists. Hatch tweeted, my brother didnt give his life fighting hitler for nazi ideas to go unchallenged here at home. And texas senator ted cruz, quote, the nazis, kkk and White Supremacists are repulsive and evil and all of us have a moral obligation to speak out. Joining me now is the mayor of charlottesville, michael signer. Mr. Mayor, i know its been a tough 48 hours for you and your job. Let me ask you this right now. 24 hours later, do you look back and think, are you prepared to say what you could have done better, what you could have done to prepare for this . Is this something that just no city can prepare for . Well, thanks, chuck. First thing i have to start by saying is that our thoughts and prayers are with the two Virginia StatePolice Troopers who lost their lives yesterday and the civilian who was killed in that. I think its clear a terrorist attack with a car used as a weapon. Our hearts are grieving right now. Three people died who didnt need to die. Charlottesville is one of the great cities in the world. Were very progressive and tolerant. We made a decision to start telling deliberately the full story of race in our city, in our past. To tell the truth. That put us on the map for a whole bunch of folks in this country who oppose everything about that. So what we saw this weekend was a deluge of outsiders trying to intimidate us away from that work. To your question, we had the largest assembly of Law Enforcement personnel in virginia since 9 11. They were charged with one mission, which was setting the conditions for people to peaceably express themselves and assemble. They didnt do that starting right at the beginning. So an Unlawful Assembly was properly called. Events unfolded from there. Were going to move past this. The healing has just begun here. We have important work to do in our democracy and were going to get going on that now. On one hand, you thanked the president for condemning the violence. But you said, i hope he looks in the mirror himself and thinks deeply about who he concerted con sorted with during the campaign. What are you referring to there . Old saying, when you dance with the devil, the devil doesnt change the devil changes you. I think they made a choice in that campaign, a very regrettable one, to really go to peoples prejudices, to go to the gutter. These influences around the country, these antisemites, nazis, kkk, they were always in the shadows. They have really given they have been given a key and a reason to come in the light. Thats exactly what happened last week. If you look to the chatter online, they said this will be a shot heard around the world in charlottesville. This is the time has come for this to stop. This should be a turning point. This movement jumped the shark and it happened yesterday. People are dieing and i do think that its now on the president and on all of us to say, enough is enough. This movement has run its course. Mr. Mayor, i know its been tough. I know you got students coming in, uva is about to begin freshmen. I will pass on to them and i know you will, charlottesville is a great city and a safe city. It is. Its a bunch of outsiders cant mess it up. Thank you. If anything, were going to get better. Thank you. Lets jump to the panel. Rich lowry, helene cooper, amy walter and joy reid. Rich, i will read from your publication today. David french wrote this. If there ever was a time in recent american political history for an american president to make a clear, unequivocal statement against the alt right it was today. Instead, we got a vague condemnation of hatred, bigotry on other sides. You had people in charlottesville who are marching in the president s name. Had you david duke name checking the president of the United States, which you would have thought made it the more important for the president to be specific denouncing these White Supremacists. This was a moment obviously where the president could have elevated himself. Instead, he came up small. Thats one of the reasons you have seen a premium on the statements from other republicans on moral clarity given the president s ambiguity. It was amazing to see that. It was almost as if the Republican Party was waiting to see what he would do and then it was a rush to say, whoa, hes on an island right now in his party. He is. Donald trump failed the fundamental test of leadership. This was and easy test for any president of the United States to clear. This is the country that heroically swooped in during world war ii, the idea that a president of the United States cannot unambiguously denounce naziism is extraordinary. Donald trump has placed himself in a history. Theres no way that i think the American People could have contemplated that their president could not unequivocally condemn david duke and nazis. He couldnt and he didnt. You know, the president s been clear, you cant defeat terrorism if you cant call it islamic terrorism. You cant unify the country without calling out hatred and bigotry. Theres no unity, theres no way you can say there are both sides to this or equal sides to this bigotry. There was one group that was bigoted and hateful and racist and then there was the anti group. Whats curious is to see where we go from here. Is the president going to choose after he is getting as you pointed out, denounced by all sides. Will he choose tomorrow to come out and make a stronger statement . He hasnt tweeted this morning. I think there hasnt been the clarify case. There hasnt been any of that. I want to throw in what Michael Gerson wrote. If great words can heal and inspire, base words can corrupt. In charlottesville, the effect became effort. Going farther saying, this was not just a choice but a strategy almost. I think thats a really interesting point to make. I think President Trump has had probably his worst week this past week. Thats because in the two instances that you alluded to earlier in the program, he has sort of fulfilled every fear that his critics and a lot of people had about him when he became president. And that is one, because of his campaign and because of the side of america that he brought out in his campaign, that he would not be able to detach himself from these White Supremacists who got him elected and who he has put in his government and in the white house. Thats one. Thats always thats been a big fear. The other two is that he would be the other great fear that people had before he became president was that he would be too loose and this is not somebody you necessarily might want in charge of a button that can launch a nuclear weapon. This is not somebody you want receiving a 3 00 a. M. Phone call. With the way he handled north korea this past week and then shockingly, shockingly what he did yesterday and what he failed to do yesterday just feeds that. People think that this is what they expected. I do think he should have specifically denounced the White Nationalists. There are two sides to this. This country has a violence fringe on the right and on the left, both of whom White Nationalists and anti fascists who like violence, who thrill to violence, like the attention that comes with it. This is going to get worse before it gets better. Can i say helene made an important point. This is an unambiguous evil plaguing the country. One of the reasons that donald trump cannot properly respond to what was an obvious proper response from an american president is the people in his government. Who is writing the talking points he was looking down and reading from . He has people like Steven Miller claimed as a mentee and steve bannon who has been allowed to meld into the normalcy of a governmental employee but who ran breitbart. Com which i reread the post that still is on their website where they selfdescribe as the home of the alt right. What is the alt right . Its addressed up term for white nationalism. They call themselves white identitarianism. That is who is in his government. Gorka who more the medal of a nazi organization, being paid by the taxpayer, in the government of donald trump, the former blogger Michael Anton in the government. He is surrounded by these people. It isnt both sides. He is in the white house they are in the white house with him. You have socalled anti fascists who dress in black, wear masks were they beating clergy yesterday . Were they attacking there was violence on both sides. They were not. I spoke with clergy being beaten with brass knuckled by neonazis. Anti fascists beat people up, break things and burn things. They both should be condemned. Im someone i want the alt right to be as limited as possible. I want it to go away and die. You are not doing folks on my side by defining it so widely that it includes Steven Miller and mike anton. Thats what they want. You are helping them you have read what they you have read the blog posts . Have you read i dont think mike anton is a White Nationalists. Im going to pause it here. We will take a break and we will have the keep having this conversation, i promise. Change it a little bit. But you will have a chance to continue when we come back. We will continue our coverage of the violence in charlottesville and the possible mainstreaming of these White Nationalists in our political system. Well be right back. In no hue anything happen. Neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair works in just one week. With the fastest retinol formula to visibly reduce wrinkles. Neutrogena®. 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One that keeps you connected to what matters most. Welcome back. In 2017, are we welcome back. S in 2017, are we seeing some of the hate groups become mainstream, part of the conversation we were having . There are 917 active hate groups in the United States. Between 2015 and 2016, we saw a 197 increase in anti mu