Elderly man tries to tear down shroud covering Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville

Henry Rodgers, DCNF

A man tried to cut down a black shroud covering a statue of Robert E. Lee with a knife in Charlottesville, Va., Wednesday afternoon.

The Charlottesville City Council unanimously voted Tuesday to cover Confederate statues to symbolize the city’s mourning of Heather Heyer, who lost her life during the violent Charlottesville riots.

In the video, the older man is seen wearing a tie dye shirt and cutting down the black tarp that workers put over the statue of Robert E. Lee earlier Wednesday.

WATCH:

Someone is cutting down the shroud on the Lee statue in #Charlottesville pic.twitter.com/3vtlCF5STW

— Lauren Berg (@laurenbergk) August 23, 2017

Man is calling the shroud of the Lee statue in #Charlottesville “desecration” pic.twitter.com/ZuWdGJYDez

— Lauren Berg (@laurenbergk) August 23, 2017

“This is a desecration and this needs to come down, ok. this cover needs to come down, now if this city is so adamant why are we not having a public referendum and vote over this,” the man said. “Slavery was the birth defect of America and it was wrong.”

All five members of the council supported removing the statue of Robert E. Lee from Emancipation Park, previously known as Lee Park.

Mayor Mike Signer asked Virginia’s General Assembly to amend its law regarding the removal of statues after the “Unite the Right” rally. There is a court injunction which currently prevents Charlottesville from removing the Robert E. Lee statue, instead they have covered it with the black tarp.

“It is time for the Jackson and Lee statues to be relocated to a battlefield park or a museum where they will neither be reviled or revered,” council member Kathy Galvin said during a Monday news conference.

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