'West Side Story' Star Rachel Zegler: Rittenhouse Verdict 'the Epitome of White Privilege'

Actress Rachel Zegler, the star of Steven Spielberg’s upcoming remake of West Side Story, says the not guilty verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial “is the epitome of white privilege” and an indictment of the United States as a whole.

“[K]yle rittenhouse being acquitted on all charges after such heinous heinous crimes is the epitome of white privilege and exactly what is wrong with this godforsaken country,” Zegler wrote Friday on social media.

kyle rittenhouse being acquitted on all charges after such heinous heinous crimes is the epitome of white privilege and exactly what is wrong with this godforsaken country.

— rachel zegler (she/her/hers) (@rachelzegler) November 19, 2021

About an hour before her tweet, the Kyle Rittenhouse trial came to a close after a jury in Kenosha, Wisconsin, found the 18-year-old not guilty of all charges.

As the news Rittenhouse’s innocence was announced, leftists across social media had a collective meltdown. Zegler joins the many Hollywood celebrities and elites who piled on Rittenhouse in the aftermath of the verdict.

A still from “West Side Story” (2021). Disney / 20th Century Studios

Like Zegler, many of the celebrities oddly claimed Rittenhouse is benefitting from “white” male “privilege.”

“If [Rittenhouse] weren’t white, he probably wouldn’t be on trial. Because he’d be dead,” proclaimed ABC’s Designated Survivor writer Pat Cunnane also focused on Rittenhouse’s skin color.

I don’t know if Kyle Rittenhouse was fake crying.

I do know that he crossed state lines and shot three people, killing two of them.

I also know that if he weren’t white, he probably wouldn’t be on trial. Because he’d be dead.

— Pat Cunnane (@PatCunnane) November 10, 2021

These comments honing in on skin color are especially bizarre, given that the law in the United States does not specify that only white men have a right to self-defense when they reasonably believe there is an imminent threat of harm.

On the same day of Rittenhouse’s acquittal, for example, another young man — who is black — claiming he fired a gun in self-defense was also found not guilty of murder.

“A Gifford man who claimed he was defending himself and his girlfriend when he fired shots at deputies during an early-morning raid in 2017 was acquitted Friday of charges that carried a life prison term,” TC Palm reported.

“A jury found Andrew ‘A.J.’ Coffee IV, 27, not guilty of second-degree felony murder, three counts of attempted first-degree murder of a law enforcement officer by discharging a firearm and one count of shooting or throwing a deadly missile,” the report added.

You can follow Alana Mastrangelo on Facebook and Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.

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