WASHINGTON -- The Cleveland Clinic is cutting another tie to President Donald Trump, canceling plans to hold its 2018 Florida fundraising gala at the Trump-owned Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach.

"After careful consideration, Cleveland Clinic has decided that it will not hold a Florida fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago in 2018," the hospital system said in a statement. "We thank the staff of Mar-a-Lago for their service over the years."

The Clinic and its CEO, Toby Cosgrove, had taken criticism for continuing to hold the annual event there.

The exit follows a decision by Cosgrove and top executives of some of the nation's leading corporations on Wednesday to disband a business advisory council that reported to the president. They said Trump's recent comments on last weekend's violence in Virginia by neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan supporters were inappropriate and didn't represent the values for which they and their organizations stood.

A 32-year-old Charlottesville woman was killed Saturday when a Maumee, Ohio man with reported Nazi sympathies allegedly plowed his car into a crowded street in the Virginia university town. This occurred during clashes involving white supremacists, shouting racist and antisemitic slurs and holding signs with symbols representing bigotry and hate. They were in Charlottesville to protest the planned removal of a statue of Confederate leader Robert E. Lee.

Although Trump read a statement Monday denouncing bigotry, racism and antisemitism, he told reporters Tuesday there was "bame on both sides" because counter-protesters, some with clubs, were intent on creating conflict. He also said there were "some very fine people on both sides" who just wanted to present their respective views in the controversy over keeping or removing statues of Confederate War heroes.

And he warned -- and repeated on Twitter today -- that the ongoing calls to remove Confederate War statues could spread to a drive to take down statues of founding fathers and early presidents, including George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, because they were slave owners, too.

...can't change history, but you can learn from it. Robert E Lee, Stonewall Jackson - who's next, Washington, Jefferson? So foolish! Also... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 17, 2017

Corporate leaders, numerous members of Congress and many Americans say Trump is showing a gross and inappropriate sense of moral equivalency.

The Nazis, who killed 6 million Jews in World War II, and Ku Klux Klan, who lynched black Americans throughout the South and whose members still want to maintain racial segregation, embodied evil, and no thoughtful American should stand with them or equivocate about "both sides," the Trump critics say.

The criticism has built throughout the week, creating public anxiety about Trump's judgment barely seven months into his presidency. Some of his supporters, however, say he has been misunderstood or was merely inartful in presenting his understanding of the Charlottesville events. White separatist and nationalist leaders have gone further and praised Trump, with former KKK leader David Duke thanking Trump for his "honesty and courage."

Thank you President Trump for your honesty & courage to tell the truth about #Charlottesville & condemn the leftist terrorists in BLM/Antifa https://t.co/tTESdV4LP0 — David Duke (@DrDavidDuke) August 15, 2017

The Cleveland Clinic system, which has a hospital in Broward County, Florida, was under public pressure to move its February fund-raiser long before this week. The Mar-a-Lago controversy erupted soon after Trump took office in January and signed an executive order to temporarily ban people from Syria and other Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.

This affected medical students and young doctors doing residencies at American hospitals, including the Cleveland Clinic. A petition drive and peaceful protests in Cleveland would not dissuade the Clinic because, officials there said, it had a binding contract with Trump's club for the 2017 event. That event wound up raising about $1 million for the Clinic's Florida hospital.

The Clinic then said it would consider moving its annual Florida gala to another location in 2018, but later said it decided to continue using the Trump Club because a committee that included donors preferred Mar-a-lago to any alternatives. The hospital stood out in this regard, since several other charitable and medical organizations that have hosted events there had decided to go elsewhere in 2018.

Trump's strong support for dismantling the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, appeared to factor into those decisions. Trump says the nation will be better off if Obamacare "implodes," citing high premiums for Americans whose incomes are too high to qualify for subsidies.

Leading medical organizations and the nonpartisan Congressional Bydget Office say the Republican repeal or replacement proposals would leave at least 22 million Americans without health coverage.

With that specific criticism, a group of medical students, health professionals and liberal interest groups launched a fresh petition drive last week to try to persuade the Clinic to abandon Mar-a-Lago.

The Clinic said last week, however, that it planned to sign a contract with Mar-a-Lago for 2018.

With the newest Trump controversy swirling, it has changed its mind.

Gloria Tavera, a Case Western Reserve University medical student who helped spearhead the petition drive, said she was pleased with the outcome, even though the Clinic "should have had the courage to walk away" from Mar-a-Lago "long ago."

The Clinic refused when immigration and health care were the pressing issues, Tavera said, but "Charlottesville was the one that broke the camel's back." It is important, she said, to "hold our institutions to account."