After a counterprotester was killed at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, many members of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) condemned its Virginia chapter for defending the First Amendment rights of the white supremacists who organized the demonstration. The critics included Waldo Jaquith, who expressed his displeasure by resigning from the ACLU of Virginia's board of directors.
In an interview with Slate's Dahlia Lithwick a few weeks later, Jaquith noted that "the ACLU gets to pick" which cases it takes. For example, he said, "you will not see the ACLU taking on any Second Amendment cases, as that is a part of the Bill of Rights that it prefers not to defend."
