House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday refused to condemn demonstrators who toppled and rolled a Christopher Columbus statue into Baltimor...
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday refused to condemn demonstrators who toppled and rolled a Christopher Columbus statue into Baltimore's Inner Harbor last weekend.
'If the community doesn't want the statue there, the statue shouldn't be there,' Pelosi, who is from Baltimore, told reporters.
'It's up to the communities to decide what statues they want to see,' Pelosi said, adding that the toppling of the Columbus statue 'doesn't diminish my pride in my Italian American heritage'.
'I think that it's very important that we take down any of the statues of people who committed treason against the United States of America,' Pelosi said.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (pictured) on Thursday refused to condemn demonstrators who toppled and rolled a Christopher Columbus statue into Baltimore's Inner Harbor last weekend
When asked whether a commission should decide what statues go rather than protesters, Pelosi responded: 'People will do what they do.'
'I do think that from a safety standpoint, it would be a good idea to have it taken down if the community doesn't want it. I don't know that it has to be a commission,' she added.
On Independence Day, a crowd pulled down the Columbus statue located near Little Italy, dragged it to the edge of the Inner Harbor and rolled it into the water. About 300 people were gathered around the area during the incident.
Pieces of the Columbus statue were retrieved from the Inner Harbor on Monday.
Crews used a pulley and a dive team to recover pieces of the statue a day after a group of people in the Little Italy neighborhood launched an unsuccessful effort to retrieve the statue with a rope.
The city's mayor, Bernard Young said Thursday that those responsible for the incident will face justice.
On Independence Day, a crowd pulled down the Columbus statue (left) located near Little Italy, dragged it to the edge of the Inner Harbor and rolled it into the water (right, officers looking at the statue that's under water)
Pieces of the Columbus statue (pictured before it was toppled) were retrieved from the Inner Harbor on Monday
Mayor Bernard Young (right) said Thursday that those responsible for the incident will face justice. Young said he was not going to tolerate the destruction of the Columbus statue, adding that while the city supports peaceful demonstrations, the incident was not peaceful
Young said he was not going to tolerate the destruction of the Columbus statue, adding that while the city supports peaceful demonstrations, the incident was not a peaceful protest.
The mayor, who lost last month's Democratic primary and will leave office in December, said the protesters cannot 'erase history. You learn from it'.
Monuments, such as ones to the 15th-century Italian explorer, 'should have something there to talk about what happened in the dark past'.
The statue's fall divided many as to how the city should handle the legacy of Columbus, a famous explorer who brutalized and enslaved nonwhites during his colonization of what is now the Dominican Republic.
Gov Larry Hogan, a Republican, decried the statue's toppling, calling on Baltimore's leaders to 'regain control of their streets' on Sunday.
In recent weeks, statues of Columbus have also been toppled or vandalized in cities such as Miami; Richmond, Virginia; St Paul, Minnesota; and Boston, where one was decapitated.
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