Organizer gets approval for rally near White House

WASHINGTON » An organizer of last year’s deadly white supremacist gathering in Charlottesville, Virginia, has received initial approval from the National Park Service to hold a rally across from the White House on Aug. 12, the anniversary of last year’s event.

Jason Kessler, who organized the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, with Richard Spencer and other white supremacist leaders, submitted a National Mall Special Event permit request on May 8 to hold a “white civil rights” rally in Lafayette Square “protesting civil rights abuse in Charlottesville.”

The Park Service approved the request but has not yet issued a permit. A Park Service spokesman said the agency is gathering information from the organizers on details of the event, and that information will be used to create the permit.

Hundreds of white nationalist marchers engaged in violent clashes and street battles with counterprotesters at the last year’s rally in Charlottesville while police initially stood by and the fights accelerated. Later that day, after the rally had been shut down by law enforcement, authorities said that James Alex Fields Jr., a self-identified Nazi, drove his car into a throng of anti-fascist marchers, killing 32-yearold Heather Heyer.

Kessler applied to hold an anniversary rally in Charlottesville, but the city denied his request. He then sued the city, saying his First Amendment rights were being denied.