TV

Meghan McCain Warns Biden: Don’t Make My Father’s Sarah Palin Mistake

‘NOT TO MAKE THIS ABOUT ME...’

“The View” host confirmed that picking Palin was one of her father’s “biggest regrets” and urged Biden not to treat the process like a “beauty queen contest.”

The hosts of The View spent Friday morning giving Joe Biden some advice as he starts his search for what he has promised will be a female running mate. Meghan McCain had just one big warning: Don’t make the same mistake her father made in 2008.

Biden has been holding virtual live stream events with prospective VP picks, which Whoopi Goldberg fretted might look like a “reality show” competition. McCain explained that she is personally not a big fan of “chemistry tests.” 

“Not to make this about me, but when I was originally offered the job on this show, they wanted to test me with a bunch of the ladies and I said, ‘No, you see what I can do,’” McCain revealed. As she explained it, she again refused to do a chemistry test a few years later and they hired her anyway. “I think vice presidential picks are the exact same way.” 

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She continued, “My father—and I know people get very triggered when I talk about him, so just bear with me—he chose an unorthodox running mate. He chose someone he hadn’t had a lot of experience with. In fact, I believe he only met Sarah Palin twice before announcing her as his vice presidential pick.” 

On his deathbed, John McCain used both his final book and an HBO documentary about his life to say that one of his “biggest regrets,” in his daughter’s words, was choosing Palin over his friend Joe Lieberman.

Because of the times we’re living in now, Meghan McCain said that he “has to go with the person who is going to lead us out of this absolute epidemic, pandemic, generational crisis, because as far as I'm concerned, it's looking like it's going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better.” 

She urged Biden to pick someone that he “trusts” as much as President Obama clearly trusted him, a point that Biden himself made during his interview with Stephen Colbert the night before. 

Taking one last swipe at Palin, McCain said that treating the decision like a “beauty queen contest” and picking someone “who can perform the best in front of a camera for 20 minutes, is probably completely ill-suited for this time.”