Despite an FBI report claiming otherwise, Alec Baldwin insists he didn’t pull the trigger of the gun that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of “Rust” last year.
The actor was on “The Chris Cuomo Project” YouTube series where he took aim at the media, specifically at The New York Post and Rupert Murdoch-owned media.
Using a somewhat unusual analogy, Baldwin states, “If George Bush’s mother Barbara fell through the ice on a pond and I waded into the pond and saved life, they’d say I groped her. They’d say I squeezed her breast while I was pulling her out of the pond. It doesn’t matter what you do – the ones that are out to get you are out to get you.”
Released last week, the gaming FBI report concluded that the gun could not have gone off without the trigger being pulled. Baldwin has long claimed the weapon fired without him pulling the trigger.
Baldwin went on to say that with all the focus on his actions on set, the “real” victim is Hutchins.
“To focus on one thing — I am not the victim here. Things for me are going to get better, cleared up. I am 1000 per cent sure. Nothing is going to bring this woman back. She’s dead. She has a little boy,” he says. “This is the real tragedy. Everything we’ve said doesn’t matter – me, the press. My point is, the real tragedy is here is what happened to this woman.”
The actor says that the “loudest” voices in the debate over what happened were not on the set of “Rust” that day. Only those people present really “know what happened”.
READ MORE: Alec Baldwin Is Told Halyna Hutchins Died In New Police Video From ‘Rust’ Shooting Investigation
“Everybody is waiting for a sheriff’s report, the DA is not bound by that report, the DA can bring charges regardless. While we wait ad nauseam for that report, every single person on the set of the film knows what happened,” he explains. “The people talking loudest about what happened or speculating about what happened were not on the set of the film – the LA Times, the Hollywood Reporter they talk on and on and on about ‘what if this’ and ‘what if that’.”
Since the aftermath of the shooting, Baldwin has suggested the people at “fault” are Assistant Director Dave Halls and Armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed for clearing the “cold” gun for use in filming.
An attorney for Baldwin refuted the FBI report, saying it had been “misconstrued”.
“The FBI report is being misconstrued. The gun fired in testing only one time — without having to pull the trigger — when the hammer was pulled back and the gun broke in two different places. The FBI was unable to fire the gun in any prior test, even when pulling the trigger, because it was in such poor condition,” he said.
No one has been criminally charged in the “Rust” shooting yet.
