“messed up” by saying “both sides” were to blame for violence and that there were “very fine people” among those marching to protect Confederate statues."
Seems to me like this is probably true.  On both sides you had disturbed lunatics and on both sides you had ordinary people with a difference of opinion.
As for moral equivalency, the Fascists and the Marxists get out of different sides of the same bed.  Between them they slaughtered a 100 million people in the 20th century.