Chynna Phillips defends sister-in-law Hilaria Baldwin over fake Spanish roots controversey - Daily Mail

'It's an awkward and embarrassing time for her': Hilaria Baldwin's sister-in-law comes to her defense in fake Spanish heritage saga as 2015 blog post reveals Hillary's American father kick-started her love affair with Spain

• Hilaria Baldwin’s sister-in-law singer Chynna Phillips defended her in a YouTube video Tuesday saying, 'She's a good woman and none of us are perfect'
• 'I feel terrible. Who’s going to throw the first stone at my sweet sister-in-law?'
• Phillips is married to William Baldwin, brother of Hilaria's husband Alec Baldwin
• A resurfaced 2015 blog post written by Hilaria's father David L. Thomas Jr, reveals she got her obsession with Spain from him
• He wrote: 'My path in life has been heavily influenced by Spanish language and culture, and not because I have one iota of latin blood in my veins' 
• Thomas and his wife Dr. Kathryn Hayward moved to the Spanish island of Majorca after retirement in 2011 when Hilaria was 27   

By Marlene Lenthang and Rachel Sharp For Dailymail.com

Published: 14:01 GMT, 3 January 2021 | Updated: 17:33 GMT, 3 January 2021

Hilaria Baldwin’s sister-in-law singer Chynna Phillips is defending her after she was exposed for faking her Spanish identity for years even though she was born in Boston saying, 'She’s a good woman and none of us are perfect.'

Phillips, who wrote the hit 'Hold On' with her girl group Wilson Phillips in 1990, spoke out on Tuesday on her Christian-themed YouTube series California Preaching.

'I feel terrible. Who’s going to throw the first stone at my sweet sister-in-law? She’s a good woman and you know, none of us are perfect. We all have issues and we all have our thing,' she said.

'This is probably an awkward and embarrassing time for Alec and Hilaria. I’ve been texting Alec the whole time to make sure he’s okay and if he needs anything,' she said to Page Six Tuesday.

Phillips is married to William 'Billy' Baldwin, the actor brother of Hilaria's husband Alec Baldwin. 

In the controversy Hilaria, 36, who she shares five kids with Alec, has come under fire for acting like she was Spanish, faking a Spanish accent when speaking English and in one live televised interview pretended she didn’t know know the English word for 'cucumber'. 

Hilaria Baldwin’s sister-in-law singer Chynna Phillips defended her in a YouTube video on Tuesday saying, 'I feel terrible. Who’s going to throw the first stone at my sweet sister-in-law? She’s a good woman and you know, none of us are perfect'

Hilaria was pictured for the first time since since she was forced to confess she had been born in Boston and not the Spanish island of Majorca as she stepped out for a stroll with her kids and husband Alec Baldwin in the Hamptons on Saturday

Phillips is married to William 'Billy' Baldwin (together above in 2010), the brother of Hilaria's husband Alec Baldwin 

She has admitted that she was born in Boston to American parents, not in Majorca, Spain, as previously claimed. She later blamed the confusion on misinformed media reports.

A resurfaced blog post written by her father in 2015 reveals that she got her love for Spain from her dad, who wrote: 'My path in life has been heavily influenced by Spanish language and culture, and not because I have one iota of latin blood in my veins.'

Her father, David L Thomas Jr, wrote about his fascination with Spain on International Integrator’s website, the company he founded with his wife Dr. Kathryn Hayward.

In the post he claims that he had a 'life changing' encounter with a Spanish priest while on a train bound for Madrid, and this man became a friend who helped him 'become thoroughly immersed in Spanish life and culture.'

Then when he and Hayward retired in 2011 they moved to the Spanish island Majorca. Hilaria was 27 at the time. 

A newly resurfaced 2009 W-4 document reveals Hilaria took two attempts to get her own name right and scribbled out her first try to write her name, after adopting Hilaria, the Spanish version of 'Hillary', as her name for years.

Hilaria's parents David L. Thomas Jr and Dr. Kathryn Hayward moved to the Spanish island of Majorca after retirement in 2011 when Hilaria was 27

A resurfaced blog post written by her father in 2015 reveals that she got her love for Spain from her dad, who wrote: 'My path in life has been heavily influenced by Spanish language and culture, and not because I have one iota of latin blood in my veins'

Hilaria revealed the truth about her upbringing in a rambling Instagram video on Sunday, saying: 'Yes, I am a white girl. I am a white girl. Let's be very clear that Europe has a lot of white people in there and my family is white. Ethnically, I am a mix of many, many, many things. Culturally, I grew up with two cultures so it's really as simple as that' 

The document shows she finally decided on Hillary L. Hayward-Thomas - the name she was born with - on her second attempt.

She was pictured for the first time since she was forced to confess she had been born in Boston as she stepped out for a stroll with her kids and husband in the Hamptons on Saturday. 

The online frenzy over Hilaria's heritage was sparked on December 21 when a woman tweeted: 'You have to admire Hilaria Baldwin's commitment to her decade long grift where she impersonates a Spanish person.' 

Hilaria seemed to lose any hint of an accent last week when she took to Instagram Live to clarify the issue. 

Family outing: Alec put a protective arm around his wife as she carried their youngest child in a sling for the walk in the Hamptons on Saturday

Hilaria was joined by at least three of their other children and two nannies before Alec joined them on Saturday in the Hamptons

After the accusations she 'faked' her Spanish heritage, Hilaria Baldwin confessed that her real name is Hillary and she was actually born in Boston, not Majorca

While Hilaria has long described her mother as Spanish, records revealed that Hayward is in fact a fourth-generation Massachusetts resident who spent most of her career practicing medicine in Longmeadow.

Kathryn went on to become an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. She have birth to Hillary in January 1984 in Boston.

CAN'T KEEP TRACK OF HER OWN STORY: HILARIA'S LATEST CONTRADICTIONS 

How she met Alec: 

Hilaria claimed that she told husband Alec from the off that she was from Boston despite his now infamous 2013 Letterman interview in which he claimed she is Spanish. 

'My wife is from Spain,' the 62-year-old had said. 

'I walked by him,' Hilaria told the Times of meeting Alec in a vegan restaurant in 2011. 

'He said, "Where are you from?" And I said, "I’m from Boston." That was the first thing I said, that has always been my narrative.'

Yet, two years later, Alec was on Letterman saying she was from Spain, which she did not give an explaination for. 

Why her Spanish accent changes: 

Hilaria says that despite being raised in Boston, she speaks in English with a Spanish accent depending on her emotions at the time.  

The Today Show incident:

The 36-year-old also claimed she was confused about the word for cucumber on the 'Today Show' because she was nervous to be on live TV for one of the first times. 

Yet she is clearly heard asking for the word in English. 

How much time she has spent in Spain:

Hilaria now says that she was born in Boston but started to visit Spain annually as a baby, implying she only vacationed in the country. 

She has previously only spoken about the Spanish island Mallorca where her parents and older brother like but not claims to have spent most of their family vacation time on mainland Spain in Madrid, Seville and Valencia. 

She told the Times that Spain 'was part of my childhood' but could not say how much time she had spent there in total.  

Claim she went to school in Spain:  

'Sometimes there was school involved. Sometimes it was vacation. It was such a mix, mishmash, is that the right word? Like a mix of different things.'

In the interview, Hilaria suggested that she went to school in Spain but there is not evidence of this.  

Her move to NYC: 

The story she told the New York Times leaves ambiguity on whether she moved to New York from Spain as she has previously said or whether she moved from another part of the US. 

'I was born in Boston. I spent time in Boston and in Spain. My family now lives in Spain. I moved to New York when I was 19 years old and I have lived here ever since,' she told the Times.

'For me, I feel like I have spent 10 years sharing that story over and over again. And now it seems like it's not enough.'

Yet Hilaria had previously said she moved from Spain.   

Profiles stating she was born in Spain: 

Hilaria alleges that she did not know that magazine ¡Hola! had written that she is Spanish as she does not read pieces about herself. 

And claims that talent organization Creative Artists Agency must have pulled their bio that states she was born in Mallorca, Spain, from the internet without fact checking.     

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Dr Hayward's father and Hilaria's grandfather, Charles 'Chuck' Hayward, was born and raised in Massachusetts, as was his late wife Irene.

Hilaria's father's family has even deeper ties to the US, having lived here since before the American Revolution. He was an active volunteer for the Beacon Hill Civic Association during his '37 years living in Boston,' The New York Post reports.

Her parents also co-founded International Integrators in Boston.

Hilaria finally came clean about her upbringing on Sunday telling fans she spent 'some of' her childhood in Spain and 'some' of it in Massachusetts.

'There was a lot of back and forth my entire life,' the Mom Brain podcaster explained.

'And I'm really lucky that I grew up speaking two different languages and I'm trying to raise my kids, so they speak two languages too. And that's something very important to me especially having my family abroad.'

Hilaria added: 'Yeah I'm a different kind of Bostonian but that's who I am, and you kind of can't change your background - nor would I want to - I'm really, really proud of who I am.' 

She also noted that '44 people from Spain' attended her 2012 wedding to Oscar nominee Alec Baldwin, but she hasn't seen her family since September 2019 because of 'the pandemic'.

The NYU alum and her 62-year-old husband gave all five of their children Spanish names - daughter Carmen Gabriela, 7; son Rafael Thomas, 5; son Leonardo Ángel, 4; son Romeo Alejandro, 2; and son Eduardo 'Edu' Pao Lucas, 3 months.

As for her name, Hilaria said she'd use Hillary in the States and Hilaria in Spain.

'My whole family call me Hilaria. It always kind of bothered me that neither name sounds good in the other language. So I would use one or the other one,' she said.

Her video sparked a flurry of memes with some jokingly comparing her to Rachel Dolezal and Jessica Krug.

Krug, a professor of African American history at George Washington University, pretended to be black her entire career. Dolezal, a former NAACP leader, was unmasked as a white woman in 2015.

Despite claiming Majorca was her birthplace and that she only arrived into the US at the age of 19, DailyMail.com revealed that Hilaria grew up in a 100-year-old $4million house in the heart of the most desirable district in Boston.

Records show her parents bought the five-bed, five-bath house on Pinckney Street in June 1987 when their daughter was just three years old. They didn't move out till she had turned 28.

DailyMail.com also discovered the only property her parents currently own on the island of Majorca in their names are two apartments dating from the 1960s in the center of Inca which they purchased last summer.

In an 80-minute cringe-worthy interview with the New York Times last week Hilaria denied she was guilty of cultural appropriation and that she ever tried to pretend she was Spanish at any time.

Alec has defended his wife over the scandal lashing out at a critic Monday night who called his wife Hilaria a 'fraud'.

The SNL actor launched his latest attack on Monday night in the comments of an Instagram photo he posted in reference to the scandal, which featured the famous Mark Twain quote: 'A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.'

A commenter quipped: 'Like your wife being Spanish when she lived in Massachusetts her entire life. I take it her accent is fake as well? FRAUDS!'

Alec's reply was scathingly succinct: 'Go f**k yourself.'

He took a more subdued swipe at another critic via Twitter just before the Instagram spat, in response to a post about an opinion essay for People entitled: 'Why the Hilaria Baldwin Scandal Is Painful for Immigrants — Including Me.'

The essay by Ale Russian slammed Hilaria for the 'exaggerated' accent she 'appropriated as an adult'. 

Alec replied: 'Fake? Exaggerated? Appropriated an accent as an adult? She lived in Spain for many years as a child. She lived both places.'   

This came after he first leaped to her defense in a social media video on Sunday. 

Without addressing the allegations directly, the SNL star said Twitter is 'a lot of s**t'. 

Alec and Hilaria Baldwin married in 2012 and share five kids together. The couple pictured together in March

'You have to kind of hack your way through the debris of Twitter. Twitter is just a vast orchard of cr**,' he continued. 

'There's things that have been said lately about people that I love, that I care about deeply, which are ridiculous. I mean, just ridiculous.

'They've said it about people I love - false things. Untrue things. 

'And as much as that hurts, the only thing I can do is talk to that half of the public or that portion of the public who understands what I mean when I say: "Consider the source. When you love somebody you want to defend them."'

On Monday he posted a quote seemingly about the incident to his Instagram page which read: 'A lie can travel around the world and back again while the truth is lacing up its shoes.' 

A video of Alec on The Late Show in 2013 emerged Monday in which he impersonated his wife's 'Spanish' accent, telling David Letterman: 'My wife is from Spain.' 

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