16 Members of White House Arts Committee Resign to Protest Trump

Sixteen members of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities resigned Friday to protest President Trump’s “hateful rhetoric” and defense of white nationalists following the violent rally in Charlottesville last weekend, the Washington Post reported. “Reproach and censure in the strongest possible terms are necessary following your support of the hate groups and terrorists who killed and injured fellow Americans in Charlottesville,” the committee members wrote in a letter. “The false equivocations you push cannot stand. The Administration’s refusal to quickly and unequivocally condemn the cancer of hatred only further emboldens those who wish America ill. We cannot sit idly by, the way that your West Wing advisors have, without speaking out against your words and actions.” Committee members include actor Kal Penn, director George C. Wolfe, and painter and photographer Chuck Close, among others. Their resignation comes after two White House corporate advisory boards disbanded earlier this week in protest of the president’s comments.