U.S. President Donald Trump speaks about the violence, injuries and deaths at the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville as he talks to the media in the lobby of Trump Tower in Manhattan, New York, U.S., August 15, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump on Thursday fired back at a critic in his own party who had denounced the president’s response to the Charlottesville, Virginia, attack, saying he had not drawn a “moral equivalency” between white hate groups and counter-protesters.

Trump, on Twitter, called fellow Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham’s statement a day earlier “a disgusting lie.” On Wednesday, Graham had said Trump’s statements after the weekend attack had suggested “moral equivalency” between the two sides and urged him to instead use his words to heal Americans instead.