A news report quoted Alec Baldwin saying, “How about I just f----- shoot the both of ya?”
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No, this Baldwin quote in a news story about prop gun incident isn’t authentic
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- This quote didn’t appear in the original news story.
- "We didn’t report it or write it and we have non reason to believe it is remotely true," one of the reporters said.
On Oct. 21, actor Alec Baldwin fired a prop gun on a movie set in New Mexico, killing the film’s cinematographer and injuring its director, according to the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office, which is investigating the killing.
The fatal incident has drawn widespread news coverage, including by Variety, which has reported on the developing story and death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins.
A screenshot of what appears to be an excerpt from that story is being shared on social media, but with an addition that wasn’t in the original article.
"According to an on-set source, the director had called for another take when Baldwin (jokingly) remarked ‘Another take? How about I just f------ shoot the both of ya?’ before firing on the pair," it looks like the story says in the screenshot shared on Instagram.
But that line, circled in red for emphasis, doesn’t actually appear in the story.
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Gene Maddaus, an enterprise reporter for Variety who co-wrote the story with deputy editor Pat Saperstein, told PolitiFact that the sentence "did not come from us."
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"We didn’t report it or write it and we have no reason to believe it is remotely true," Maddaus said.
We reviewed archived snapshots of the story — 36 had been taken using the Wayback Machine as of about 5 p.m. on Oct. 22 — and none included the quote in the Instagram post. We also couldn’t find any credible source elsewhere online quoting Baldwin as saying this, though it did appear on the website 4chan, where disinformation is often shared.
Baldwin tweeted a statement on Oct. 22 saying he had "no words" to convey his shock and sadness about "the tragic accident that took the life of Halyna Hutchins, a wife, mother and deeply admired colleague of ours."
We rate this post False.
Our Sources
Instagram post, Oct. 22, 2021
The New York Times, An Alec Baldwin western becomes the scene of a fatal shooting, Oct. 22, 2021
Wayback Machine, Variety story archived snapshots, visited Oct. 22, 2021
Variety, Alec Baldwin fired prop gun that killed cinematographer Halyna Huchins, injured director, Oct. 21, 2021
Alec Baldwin quote, Oct. 22, 2021
Interview with Gene Maddaus, enterprise reporter, Variety, Oct. 22, 2021
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No, this Baldwin quote in a news story about prop gun incident isn’t authentic
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