Pablo Martinez Monsivai/AP 45 After Dark: Infrastructure Day edition

President Donald Trump is back where he started.

A day after Trump spoke from the rarefied space of the White House, bowing to criticism that his response to deadly, racially charged protests in Charlottesville, Virginia was lukewarm and blamed both sides he abruptly reversed course again today. This time from the lobby of his own Trump Tower in New York City, Trump engaged in a stunning, combative back-and-forth with the press, holding an impromptu news conference in which he effectively reversed course from just a day ago.


Once again, Trump said all sides share blame for the eruption of violence. At times visibly angry, he also argued that a movement to tear down and remove Confederate Civil War monuments could grow into an effort to tear down statues of America’s first president, George Washington.

“What about the alt-left that came charging at the, as you say, the alt-right? Do they have any semblance of guilt?” Trump said.

As POLITICO’s Annie Karni, Eliana Johnson and Nolan D. McCaskill report the press conference left mouths agape — including Trump’s staff who had gathered for a press conference on infrastructure , replete with charts and two cabinet members, Treasury Sec. Steve Mnuchin and Transportation Sec. Elaine Chao, there to add to the discussion.

Instead, Trump took over.

“With no teleprompter to keep him on a message crafted for him by his top aides, like chief of staff John Kelly, Trump reverted to the ‘many sides’ language he ad-libbed on Saturday — remarks that earned him criticism from Republicans and Democrats alike, and even pushback from his own top aides.”

Negative reaction was virtually instantaneous — Republican members of Congress, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, rejected Trump’s newest remarks. More members of Trump’s manufacturing advisory board announced they would be leaving in the wake of his latest remarks.

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Meanwhile, white supremacists cheered :

"Thank you President Trump for your honesty & courage to tell the truth about Charlottesville & condemn the leftist terrorists," tweeted David Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan leader and outspoken Trump supporter who attended the Charlottesville protest.

Elsewhere in President Trump’s orbit:

STRANGE DAYS: Polls closed in an Alabama Senate primary, where President Trump has backed incumbent Sen. Luther Strange in the race to fill Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ former Senate seat.

SUBSIDY SUBMARINE: Yanking Obamacare subsidies, as President Trump is considering , would raise premiums by 20 percent next year and increase the deficit by nearly $200 billion according to the CBO.

RTS DO NOT EQUAL ENDORSEMENTS: President Trump retweeted — then deleted — a tweet that called him a “fascist.”

BRAND X TOWERS: White House officials appeared to go to pains to not self promote Trump brands during President Trump’s visit to Trump Towers today.

RUSSIAN TO MEET: The Washington Post reports that in emails turned over to congressional investigators a low-level Trump foreign policy aide repeatedly wrote that Russians wanted to meet with the Trump campaign.

A CLIMATE CHANGE: President Trump is reversing an Obama era regulation that requires building projects to account for rising sea levels brought on by climate change. (Washington Post)

BACK STORY: A fascinating Atlantic story about how A.J. Delgado went from a key Trump aide to a single Mom, living in Miami far from the president she helped to elect.

There you have it. You’re caught up on the Trump administration. Happy Friday.