The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority will not provide white supremacists with access to their own train cars, the agency’s chair said on Saturday. Metro had been considering offering separate trains or individual train cars to demonstrators attending the Unite the Right rally next Sunday in Washington, DC.
The decision not to provide hate groups with separate transportation came after Jackie Jeter, the president of the largest Metro union attacked the idea on Friday in a statement. Jeter said members of Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 689 are āproud to provide transit to everyone for the many events we have in D.C. including the March [for] Life, the Womenās March and Black Lives Matter.ā
She added, āWe draw the line at giving special accommodation to hate groups and hate speech.ā
Organizers describe Sundayās Unite the Right rally as a āwhite civil rightsā event, and have scheduled it to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the white nationalist gathering in Charlottesville, Virginia. That rally sparked intense violence and led to the death of Heather Heyer, a 32-year-old paralegal, when a Nazi sympathizer drove his car into counter-protesters. Several hundred men carrying torches chanted āJew will not replace usā as they marched around the University of Virginiaās campus the night before.
On Friday, Metro board chair Jack Evans said the agency was considering providing protesters with separate train cars to prevent violence. āWeāre not trying to give anyone special treatment,ā Evans said. āWeāre just trying to avoid scuffles and things of that nature.ā He also said that no final decisions had been made, adding, āWeāre just trying to come up with potential solutions on how to keep everybody safe.ā
But on Saturday, Evans decided against separating the white nationalists attending the rally. “Metro will not be having a separate train, or a separate car, or anything separate for anybody at this event that’s gonna happen next Sunday,” he told Washingtonās NBC affiliate. When NBC4 asked Evans if he regretted considering separating the protesters, he claimed the idea āwas never under consideration.ā
āWe’d like to keep the groups separate,ā Evans told the station one day before. āWe don’t want incidents on Metro.”
The statement from ATU Local 689 noted that more than 80 percent of the unionās members are people of color, āthe very people that the Ku Klux Klan and other white nationalist groups have killed, harassed and violated.” The union local said it would “not play a role in their special accommodation.ā