Cheney on TV: 'Unapologetic' About Handling of Shooting

By: Joe Strupp and Greg Mitchell In an exclusive interview with Fox News' Brit Hume this afternoon, Vice President Dick Cheney took full responsibility for shooting his hunting companion, who has until now been pictured as the guilty party. The interview will not air in full until 6 p.m., but according to Hume, in summarizing the contents, the vice president remained "totally unapologetic" about the long lag in reporting the shooting to the public -- and also said that he had consumed one beer at lunch that day.

Speaking on camera and disclosing some of the unaired footage, Hume said Cheney was "utterly unapologetic" about the reporting lag but "a shaken man" in his interview. In comments on the cable channel just minutes after ending a 25-minute interview with Cheney, Hume described the encounter as revealing, but with little contrition on Cheney's part.

"He didn?t blame anyone else, he blamed himself [for the shooting]," Hume told Fox's Shepard Smith during a brief conversation. "But he didn't take blame for the way it was handled?the White House press corps be damned."

Hume indicated that Cheney called last Saturday's accidental shooting "one of the worst days of my life," but that the vice president was certain that he handled it correctly by waiting nearly a day to make it public. He also revealed that Cheney disclosed having a beer with lunch that day, but stressed that it was several hours before the shooting occurred.

Ranch owner Katharine Armstrong has said no one hunting that day had any beer. The Los Angeles Times reported on Tuesday that it had been told that the hunters that day "broke for a lunch of antelope, jicama salad and camp bread, washed down with Dr. Pepper." Armstrong later modified her remarks, saying there may have been beer in coolers but she didn't think anyone who was hunting that day had any.

CNN today reports that Armstrong had told CNN she never saw Cheney or Whittington "drink at all on the day of the shooting until after the accident occurred, when the vice president fixed himself a cocktail back at the house."

"Ultimately I'm the guy who pulled the trigger, that fired the round that hit Harry," Cheney said in his Hume interview. "I'm the guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend, and that's something I'll never forget....

"The image of him falling is something I will never be able to get out my mind," Cheney said, somberly. "It was one of the worst days of my life."

After days of White House and other administraton offiicials, and Katharine Armstrong, faulting the victim, Cheney said, "It was not Harry's fault. You cannot blame anybody else."

Whittington was in stable condition on Wednesday, hospital officials said earlier on Wednesday. But the 78-year-old was moved back into the intensive care unit because of concerns for his privacy.

Cheney said he agreed that ranch owner Armstrong should make the story public, because she was an eyewitness, because she grew up on the ranch and because she is "an acknowledged expert in all of this" as a past head of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. He also agreed with her decision to choose the local newspaper as the way to get the news out.

"I thought that made good sense because you can get as accurate a story as possible from somebody who knew and understood hunting and then it would immediately go up to the wires and be posted on the Web site, which is the way it went out and I thought that was the right call," Cheney said.

"What do you think now?" Hume asked.

"I still do," Cheney responded. "The accuracy was enormously important. I had no press person with me."

NBC News called the vice president?s office for comment four times Tuesday and Wednesday, it disclosed today, and asked whether the vice president or anyone in the hunting party had consumed any alcohol on Saturday prior to the accident. In an e-mail statement Wednesday to NBC News, the vice president?s press secretary referred NBC News to the Kenedy County Sheriff?s Department report on the incident, which said it did not believe alcohol use was a factor in the shooting.

At a news conference Wednesday outside Whittington?s hospital in Corpus Christi, reporters asked hospital officials whether Whittington?s blood-alcohol level had been tested. The officials responded with a "no comment."