Watch: ‘Morning Joe’ Hammers Baldwin, ‘Rust’ Crew for Not Checking Gun — ‘Just the Basics’ of Safety

Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” host Joe Scarborough criticized actor Alec Baldwin and the people who worked with him on the “Rust” film set for not checking if his gun was loaded with live ammunition before the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins.

Scarborough said, “You have three different people that had custody of this gun. This is something we talked about a few days ago. Anybody that’s ever been around a handgun or any gun, again, rule number one, you never pointed at anybody, but rule number two, you always assumed the gun is loaded. You always check and see if it’s a hot gun or not. You look in the chamber. That’s the first step. I can’t say it enough. Like I said before, that’s the equivalent of getting your keys and opening a door before you even go into the car. Those are the basics.”

He continued, “The fact you had three people here who had custody of the gun. You had the armor, you then had Dave Halls, the assistant director, and you had Alec Baldwin. All three of those people, if they ever handled guns before, would have checked every chamber if it’s on the revolver. The thing is, you do it two or three times. It’s like a nervous tick. You almost feel stupid the second or third times you check to see if it’s hot. That is just the basics of gun safety.”

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