Bubba Wallace Tells Fox’s Jesse Watters He Was Right to Call Attention to Garage Incident: ‘It Was a Noose’
Bubba Wallace (Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images)
NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace does not regret issuing a statement on the incident in his garage, insisting in an interview set to air on Saturday, “It was a noose.”
“Everybody has seen the image now,” Wallace said, according to a transcript of the interview with Fox News host Jesse Watters airing Saturday night. “So, to say we would go back and do things differently, I don’t think so. Maybe word things differently, yes but I would launch an investigation. I would follow NASCAR’s judgement on it again.”
On Sunday night, NASCAR announced an investigation following the discovery of a rope in Wallace’s garage at the Talladega Superspeedway which had been tied as a noose. Wallace issued his own statement on the incident after being told of the noose. The FBI conducted an investigation, and according to NASCAR determined it to be a “garage door pull rope fashioned like a noose,” which had been in place since October 2019.
NASCAR releases photo to the media of the garage pull rope formed as a noose from the Bubba Wallace garage Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway.
This image was provide by NASCAR. pic.twitter.com/Z4ZyBzpREF— Marty Smith (@MartySmithESPN) June 25, 2020
Wallace received an outpouring of support following the incident, including from NASCAR drivers and staff who expressed their solidarity with Wallace by pushing his car to the front of the Talladega track. The driver told Watters that he was not motivated by a desire for attention.
“Let’s get it straight,” Wallace said. “ This wasn’t used as a publicity stunt on my end. I don’t need all the fame and all the media hype to create my brand and create my image. People that know me know I’m 100 percent raw and real and I just go out and give my all on the racetrack, and I’m the human being everybody else is off the race track. I put my pants on the same way.”
Wallace said that he could have been “more proactive” by seeking out a picture of the rope or “seeing it for myself in person” rather than learning about it from a NASCAR official, but added, “At the end of the day, I wouldn’t have changed anything.”
