Former Trump spokesperson Stephanie Grisham clashed with the hosts of daytime talk show The View on Tuesday morning over their “name-calling,” pleading with them to stop calling Republicans “idiots” as it only causes them to “close ranks” and “double down.”
Grisham, who has spent months distancing herself from the Trump administration and rehabilitating her media image as a moderate Republican, made her return as The View’s guest conservative host on Tuesday.
During one of the program’s “Hot Topic” discussions, the panel touched on MAGA-boosting Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) calling GOP senators “pro-pedophile” if they support Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court nomination.
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“Can I apologize to Sarah Palin? This woman makes Sarah Palin look like Madame Curie,” liberal co-host Joy Behar quipped. “And not a word about her pal Matt Gaetz, who is under investigation for a year for dating an underage girl.”
Grisham, for her part, said Greene’s attack was “offensive and missed the mark,” adding that the pro-Trump lawmaker was “attacking our own party” rather than focusing on expanding the GOP’s brand ahead of the midterms.
“The Republicans are about to probably take over the House and the Senate,” she declared. “[President Joe] Biden’s poll numbers are tanking and her focus is to be childish, call names to Republicans. It’s completely missing the mark.”
Co-host Sunny Hostin eventually retorted that while it’s true that Biden’s approval numbers are sagging, the Republicans may also have their own troubles due to the antics of Greene and others.
“That part is true, but what about the fact that the Republicans can’t seem to get her in line? Everyone says the Republicans get in line and Democrats don't,” Hostin asserted. “They need to get her in line. She’s a maniac!”
After Hostin snarked that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy claims the GOP has “got a big tent,” fellow host Sara Haines exclaimed that “no tent is big enough for Marjorie Taylor Greene.” Haines also took issue with the Georgia lawmaker and other conservatives “dog-whistling” to QAnon conspiracists with their pedophile accusations.
Moments later, Behar referenced a passionate Trump supporter recently describing George Bush as a Nazi while expressing support for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“Then you think, how dumb is this woman? Just remember one thing, she'll be voting,” Behar lamented. “Everybody needs to vote is the point. Otherwise, we're sunk!”
Grisham, however, lectured the liberal comedian and the rest of the table over their strident assessments of not only Greene and the Trump supporter, but of Republicans in general.
“The more we call people idiots, even when they say these idiotic things, the more the right gets all—they close ranks,” the ex-Trump flack stated. “And they double down. They will come out voting too!” Hostin, meanwhile, shot back that “silence is being complicit,” prompting Grisham to insist that she’s “not saying be complicit” but instead asking that they not “denigrate” conservatives.
“You got to call a person when they’re an idiot. It’s taking down our country,” Hostin retorted, adding: “Marjorie Taylor Greene is an idiot! That’s the definition. You open up the dictionary, look up idiot and you see her picture.”
Whoopi Goldberg finally interjected, wondering if Grisham agreed that it’s “idiotic” to call a former president a Nazi. The former White House press secretary responded that the woman’s remarks were “not a smart answer” but that “we can’t keep attacking people because they double down and vote” for extremist candidates.
“It was an uneducated answer, I’ll leave it at that,” Grisham added.
“All of those words kind of mean the same thing,” Goldberg fired back. “And they should mean the same thing to you that they mean to me. The Bushes are not Nazis. That is ridiculous!”
Grisham, pleading once more, added that she just wants “people to have an off-ramp.”
Her pleas, however, fell on deaf ears.
“They’re off their rocker ramp,” Behar joked at the end.
