Trump goes to Pittsburgh in the middle of the funeral and asks him to stay away

PITTSBURGH (Reuters) – US President Donald Trump was due to travel to Pittsburgh on Tuesday as grieving people prepared to hold the first funeral for the victims of the synagogue massacre and Jewish leaders said he would not be welcome until he denounced white nationalism.

Trump announced that he would visit hospitalized police officers and other wounded people during the Saturday shootings at the Tree of Life synagogue, which killed 11 worshipers during the most lethal attack ever carried out against the American Jewish community.

"I'm just going to pay tribute to my friends," Trump told Fox News Monday evening. "I would have done it earlier, but I did not want to disturb more than it already was. But I can not wait to go to Pittsburgh.

Robert Bowers, 46, is charged with entering the synagogue in the Squirrel Hill section of Pittsburgh shouting "All Jews Must Die" and opening fire on members of three congregations who hold prayer services in the area. Sabbath.

The bloodshed has intensified the national debate over Trump's political rhetoric, which critics say has contributed to the soaring right-wing extremism in the United States.

"Yes, words matter," said Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto, Democrat, Monday in an interview for CNN.

The Trump administration rejected the idea that it was encouraging white nationalists and neo-Nazis who had embraced it. Trump said during the interview on Fox News that he did not have to clarify his nationalism.

"It means that I love the country, it means I'm fighting for the country," he said. "I'm proud of this country and I call it nationalism. I call it being a nationalist and I see no other connotation than this one. "

"YOU ARE NOT WELCOME"

Rabbi Jeffrey Myers of Tree of Life told ABC Monday that the President of the United States was always welcome.

But a group of local Jewish leaders said in an open letter to Trump: "You are not welcome to Pittsburgh until you have completely denounced white nationalism".

More than 43,000 people have signed the letter, organized and put online by the Pittsburgh chapter, Bend the Arc, a Jewish organization opposed to what it calls "the immoral agenda of the Trump administration and the Republican party."

Pittsburgh Mayor Peduto was also opposed to Trump's visit because it would coincide with the first funeral. David Rosenthal, 54, and his brother Cecil Rosenthal, 59, are due to be buried on Tuesday.

Peduto said Trump should wait for all the funerals to be held, and that the visit and the extra security measures planned would distract from the "priority" of burying the dead.

The trip comes just a week before the controversial November 6 congressional elections, which will determine whether Trump's Republican party will retain a majority in Congress.

On Monday, a US judge ordered the suspect, Bowers, to be held without bail. The former truck driver, who frequently published antisemitic materials online and which his neighbors described as a loner, was charged with 29 federal crime charges and could incur the death penalty in case of death. conviction.

Prosecutors said mass shooting was a hate crime.

In addition to the 11 mostly elderly, who were killed, six people, including four policemen, were wounded before the suspect was shot dead by the police and surrendered. Two of the surviving victims remained hospitalized in critical condition.