WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – A monument honoring dead Confederate soldiers in a West Palm Beach cemetery will be removed.
Mayor Jeri Muoio said Monday that the Confederate monument at Woodlawn Cemetery will be placed in storage until the United Daughters of the Confederacy decide what to do with it.
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"I believe strongly they are symbols of hate and bigotry, and we don't want that here in our city," Muoio told the SunSentinel.
The decision comes after the monument was vandalized during the weekend. Police said it had also been vandalized two weeks earlier.
President Donald Trump said last week on Twitter that the recent push to remove Confederate monuments from southern cities is "foolish."
Sad to see the history and culture of our great country being ripped apart with the removal of our beautiful statues and monuments. You.....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 17, 2017
...can't change history, but you can learn from it. Robert E Lee, Stonewall Jackson - who's next, Washington, Jefferson? So foolish! Also...
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 17, 2017
...the beauty that is being taken out of our cities, towns and parks will be greatly missed and never able to be comparably replaced!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 17, 2017
A driver earlier this month plowed a car into a crowd of counter protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was being removed.