Even as the hosts of Fox & Friends pushed back against President Donald Trump for his fawning press conference with Vladimir Putin this week, Fox News’ Judge Jeanine Pirro defended him, asking, “What was he supposed to do, take a gun out and shoot Putin?”
On Thursday morning, she took that undying loyalty to The View.
Pirro began by stating that she was never in contention to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court, despite Donald Trump Jr. tweeting that it would be “awesome.” She was more cagey when asked about whether she has been gunning for Jeff Sessions’ job.
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“I have spoken to him, not about getting the job, no, but about having someone in that job, I don't care who it is, as long as it's an attorney general who is not in the closet hiding somewhere, who 24 hours after he took the job said, I'm not going to do anything with respect to the election,” Pirro said, directly attacking Sessions for recusing himself from the Russia investigation.
Asked if she would take the job, Pirro said, “I haven’t been offered the job.” But as co-host Meghan McCain pointed out, “That’s not a no.”
Pirro continued to unabashedly defend Trump’s meeting with Putin and attack former President Obama for not doing enough to keep Russia in check. Every time the hosts tried to criticize Trump’s behavior, she turned around and asked, “And what did Barack Obama do?”
Later, when Pirro’s new book, titled Liars, Leakers and Liberals, came up, guest-host Ana Navarro joked: “I thought she was describing the Trump White House.”
Pirro insisted that she is “not an ideologue,” which might come as a shock to anyone who has ever viewed her Fox News program. But, she added, “I know a con when I see it.” Pirro was not talking about the Trump presidency, but rather the Russia investigation, which she characterized as “fake.”
“You just said you're not an ideologue,” Navarro said. “Do you think Donald Trump embraces and embodies conservative ideology? He used to have a different position on pro-choice, he is imposing tariffs, he's against globalism. Do you think he's an ideologue that is faithful to conservative policies?”
“I’m not here to talk about what Donald Trump is or isn’t,” Pirro said, dodging the question. When she asked Navarro to name one metric in which the U.S. is “worse off” since Trump took office, the Republican strategist shot back, “Hate crimes are worse off!”
Then, as moderator Whoopi Goldberg tried to get a question in, Pirro accused her of having “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” a dismissal recently popularized by the president himself.
“Did you just point at me?” Goldberg asked. “Listen, I don't have Trump derangement. Let me tell you what I have. I’m tired of people starting a conversation with ‘Mexicans are liars and rapists.’” She added, “Listen, I'm 62 years old. There have been a lot of people in office that I didn't agree with. But I have never, ever seen anything like this. I have never seen anybody whip up such hate. I have never seen anybody be so dismissive.”
From there, they started shouting back and forth at each other about what’s more “horrible,” when “people who shouldn't be here end up murdering the children of American citizens,” as Pirro argued, or “when the president of the United States whips up people to beat the hell out of people,” as Goldberg added.
“Say goodbye, I’m done!” Goldberg said abruptly at that point, cutting off their guest and ending the segment before it could get any more combative.
After a break, when Pirro had left the set, Goldberg looked into the camera and said, “So you saw me do something I very rarely do. I very rarely lose my cool. And I'm not proud of it. I don't like it. But I also don't like being accused of being hysterical. That's one of those things I try not to be on this show.”
“So, have a great day,” she added before the credits rolled.
