The two people he most relies on in a time of crisis were not present as he inexplicably vented during a Trump Tower press conference.
Following President Trump’s fiery tirade in the lobby of Trump Tower Tuesday, speculation is growing that he lashed out because he's been feeling alone without the people he relies on the most.
Read: White Supremacists Losing Their Jobs, Disowned by Family After Social Media Outs Them
Daughter Ivanka is on a family vacation and first lady Melania stayed behind at his golf resort in Bedminster, N.J.
Trump returned to his Fifth Avenue Manhattan high rise Monday night. On Tuesday afternoon, he held a press conference about infrastructure that devolved into a rogue rant.
The president spent hour after lonely hour watching TV coverage criticizing his tepid response to the violence in Charlottesville, The New York Times reported. As he addressed reporters, he unexpectedly vented, blaming both neo-Nazis and counter-protesters for the violence in Virginia Tuesday.
Newly appointed Chief of Staff John Kelly actually appeared to wince as his boss spoke. Photos show him looking down, arms folded, concern etched in his face.
“It was an electric moment here at Trump Tower as we all saw as the president poured fuel on a political fire,” CBS News White House and Senior Foreign Affairs Correspondent Margaret Brennan told Inside Edition.
She suggested that the president's familiar surroundings may have had something to do with the outburst.
“This is the first time that President Trump has returned to his Manhattan home since he was inaugurated," Brennan said. "He spoke as if he were in his own home in his own element as Donald Trump the individual and less so from the trappings of the presidency."
The Trump Tower lobby had been hung with heavy blue curtains to conceal signage for Ivanka's clothing and jewelry brand and a soon-to-open store.
The president's remarks brought an avalanche of protest, including one staged Tuesday night by filmmaker Michael Moore and actor Mark Ruffalo, who bussed people from Broadway, where the Fahrenheit 9/11 director is performing, to Trump Tower.
In addition, former presidents George W. and George H.W. Bush issued a rare joint statement condemning racism: "America must always reject racial bigotry, anti-Semitism and hatred in all forms."
A tweet President Obama sent Saturday following the violence in Virginia, which contained a powerful quote frome one of his heroes, Nelson Mandela, has now become the most liked tweet on the social media platform.
The post, which contained an image of the former president greeting children of various skin colors, and the Mandela quote "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion...," has more than 3.5 million likes.
"No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion..." pic.twitter.com/InZ58zkoAm
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 13, 2017
Former Massachusetts senator and 2012 GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney also slammed Trump’s rhetoric.
No, not the same. One side is racist, bigoted, Nazi. The other opposes racism and bigotry. Morally different universes.
— Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) August 16, 2017
The president appeared to condemn the removal of Confederate memorials Tuesday during his angry diatribe, which the white supremacists had been protesting.
Four confederate memorials were removed by the city of Baltimore overnight. A confederate memorial in Los Angeles has also been removed.
In Durham, N.C., the woman who prosecutors say led protestors to haul down a statue of a Confederate soldier has been charged with a felony.
The mother of Heather Heyer, the 32-year-old paralegal killed when a car plowed into a crowd of people spoke at a memorial service for her daughter Wednesday.
“They tried to kill my child to shut her up!" she defiantly said. "Well, guess what? You just magnified her."
