Trump - who branded BLM supporters ‘thugs’ - calls Kyle Rittenhouse ‘nice young man’

Former President Donald Trump called Kyle Rittenhouse “a really nice young man” after he visited him at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida - a contrast from his dismissal of Black Lives Matter activists as ‘thugs’.

In a recent interview with Sean Hannity of Fox News, Trump said he got to know Rittenhouse at his southern retreat, explaining: “I got to know him a little bit - he called and wanted to know he can come over and say hello ‘cause he was a fan.”

Trump added that Rittenhouse came over with his mother and that he was a “really nice young man”, and said that he endured “prosecutorial misconduct” during his high-stakes trial.

The 18-year-old shot and killed two men and injured another during protests last year in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Sign up to our new free Indy100 weekly newsletter

Trump has previously railed against BLM, calling it a “symbol of hate” and saying that some of its supporters were “thugs.”

In June 2020, he criticized New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s proposal to paint “Black Lives Matter” in large lettering on the street in front of Trump’s eponymous Manhattan tower.

When his Twitter account was active, he wrote that they wanted “to paint the fabled & beautiful Fifth Avenue, right in front of Trump Tower/Tiffany, with a big yellow Black Lives Matter sign.”

In late August 2020, Trump told Fox News host Laura Ingraham that the moment was “bad for Black people” and was a “Marxist organization.”

“The first time I ever heard of Black Lives Matter, I said, ‘That’s a terrible name.’ It’s so discriminatory. It’s bad for Black people. It’s bad for everybody,” he said,

He also claimed that BLM’s “first phrase” was “Pigs in a blanket, fry ‘em like bacon.”