Rittenhouse tells Fox News he’s ‘not a racist person’
NEW YORK — Kyle Rittenhouse, who was acquitted on charges stemming from killing two men and wounding another during the unrest that followed the shooting of a Black man by a white police officer, said in a wide-ranging interview that aired Monday night he’s “not a racist person” and supports the Black Lives Matter movement.
“This case has nothing to do with race. It never had anything to do with race. It had to do with the right to selfdefense,” the 18-yearold told Fox News host Tucker Carlson in an interview that aired Monday night. Rittenhouse is white, as were the men he shot.
“I thought they came to the correct verdict because it wasn’t Kyle Rittenhouse on trial in Wisconsin — it was the right to self defense on trial,” Rittenhouse said in the interview. “And if I was convicted . . . no one would ever be privileged to defend their life against attackers.”
He said some people, including some who have made threats against him, are “too ignorant to look at the facts.”
“I’m not a racist person. I support the BLM movement, I support peacefully demonstrating,” Rittenhouse told Carlson. He said, “I feel like my life has been extremely defamed,” and hinted that he may be taking action.
He also hit hard at his former attorneys, John Pierce and Lin Wood, who he said used him to promote a “cause” as they raised $2 million for his bail.
When asked about that over the weekend, Pierce said he had no comment. Wood told The Associated Press that the foundation he heads, Fightback Foundation, raised money for Rittenhouse’s bail.
Rittenhouse said that his life is different from what he had planned. He said he is taking college prerequisites to become a nurse and hopes to study on campus, but is now also thinking about studying law. He plans to move from the Midwest, but is not exactly sure where he will go.
“I’m going to go lay low and live my life and enjoy it,” he said.