Donald Trump Praises Confederate Army General Robert E. Lee

On Friday (October 12th), President Trump did what he does best when he appeared at a rally in Lebanon, Ohio. With the event taking place in an effort to boost Republican voters' attendance in the midterm elections that are shortly arriving in the United States, he used the platform to give attendees a quick lesson on the history of the Civil War.

This time around he decided to focus on Robert E. Lee, the general of the Confederate Army and what he calls a "phobia" that Abraham Lincoln had of Lee.

"So Robert E. Lee was a great general and Abraham Lincoln developed a phobia, he couldn't beat Robert E. Lee," Trump told the crowd "He was going crazy...but Robert E. Lee was winning battle after battle after battle and Abraham Lincoln came home and he said 'I can't beat Robert E. Lee."

Now this ill-conceived anecdote was to lead up to Trump's introduction of Ulysses S. Grant, the Union army general recruited by Abraham Lincoln to defeat Lee's army in the Cilvil War. Grant, who went on to become the 18th president of the United States, was a native of Ohio and this marked Trump's attempt to make note of the great Ohioans who hail from the Buckeye State.

Naturally, though his decision to highlight Robert E. Lee and in turn, criticize Abraham Lincoln, and even Grant later on in the speech raised a few eyebrows and soon enough the wheels on Twitter began to go round and round.

DT