After being mum on the issue, ABC’s talk show The View made waves today, with its cohosts finally addressing the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel Live!. Deadline reports that today’s episode began with Whoopi Goldberg (Sarafina, Harlem) earnestly asking, “Did yall think we weren’t going to talk about Jimmy Kimmel? I mean, have you watched the show over the last 29 seasons? No one silences us.” Watch the complete segment at the end of this article.
According to Deadline, Goldberg explained that the show waited to speak on the issue, just in case Kimmel had statement instead. She also explained they followed the same protocol after CBS announced the cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. The broadcast then segued into each co-host having their say on the matter.
Republican political analyst Ana Navarro thanked their viewers for “demanding truth and courage from us” before explaining how she opposed the way Charlie Kirk, an advocate for free speech, was being used to silence others.
“I lived through a right-wing dictatorship in Nicaragua and I lived through a left-wing dictatorship in Nicaragua,” Navarro added via Deadline. “This is what dictators and authoritarians do. It does not matter the ideology. At first, they come with it for the people with big platforms, at first the[y] silence the press, but then they come for all of us because their intent is to scare us into silence and self-censorship.”
Alyssa Farah Griffin, a fellow co-host aligned with conservative politics, said, “The First Amendment is first for a reason, because you need to be able to hold those in power accountable,” via Deadline.
“We talk about freedom of speech a lot because we are always in somebody’s mess because somebody has decided that we have said something that’s offensive. But we fight for everybody’s right to have freedom of speech because it means my speech is free, it means your speech is free,” Goldberg stated, according to Deadline.