ABC News’s The View had become a home for far-left extremist politics. That fact was obvious during Tuesday’s episode where they invited far-left extremist writer Elie Mystal to promote his unhinged book designed to tear at American’s elevation of the rule of law. The liberal ladies gleefully welcomed his ridiculous pontifications about how all laws pre-1965 shouldn’t be considered legitimate and how there shouldn’t be voter registration laws.
There to promote his book Bad Law: Ten Popular Laws That Are Ruining America, co-host Sunny Hostin heaped praise on Mystal. “I love this book! You are dead on and it is a fantastic book! One of the laws you write about is playing out right now, the Immigration and Nationality Act,” she touted.
“One of my premises for the book is that every law passed before the 1965 Voting Rights Act should be presumptively unconstitutional,” Mystal explained. “Because before the 1965 Voting Rights Act we were functionally an apartheid country!”
Adding: “Not everybody who lived here could vote here. So, why should I give a [self-censors] about some law that some old white man passed in the 1920s, like the Immigration and Nationality Act.”
The idea that “every law passed before 1965” was “unconstitutional” was the absolutist thinking of an extremist. A dragnet that large would have massive unintended consequences far behind Mystal’s ignorant understanding.
Laws passed prior to 1965 that Mystal, and the cast of The View, would presumably support included most laws against murder, the First Amendment (freedom of speech, 1791), the Fourth Amendment (unlawful search and seizures, 1791), the 13th Amendment (the abolition of slavery, 1865), the 19th Amendment (women’s right to vote, 1920), and the National Firearms Act (1934); just to name a few.
Mystal then had a mental breakdown about America’s immigration laws, falsely suggesting people were being deported “because they didn’t fill out the paperwork correctly,” and were being put in jail “for existing”:
Now, I personally do not think I can convince people to open their hearts and minds to immigration. I understand that in our failing country treating people with respect and decency and humanity is a controversial position! And I cannot change their minds. But we can dang sure make sure we're not putting people in jail for the crime of existing!
That we’re not putting people in jail for not filling out the form in triplicate in the right time and submitting it to the right agent. Immigration status offenses should not be criminal offenses, they should be civil offenses. We shouldn't be ripping people away from their families because they didn't fill out the paperwork correctly.
No, Elie. They were being deported for not filling out any paperwork at all and not following the law. Also, it’s hypocritical to talk about how you want to treat people with “humanity” on The View. The day prior, The View cast defended suggestions that President Trump and his supporters were not human beings. Moderator Whoopi Goldberg had also made it clear that she doesn’t see Trump as human.
Faux conservative Alyssa Farah Griffin was as useless as ever. Instead of having a spine and pushing back on Mystal’s extremism, she noted there were things they disagreed on (didn’t say what those were), and asked: “So, what do you see as sort of the marginal changes that are actually really tangible and realistic that could be put in place the next few years?”
And what was that “tangible and realistic” idea that Mystal had? “I argue that we should eliminate all voter registration laws,” he demanded.
He asserted it was “realistic” because “we already have voter eligibility requirements” like age. He then started shouting about how voter fraud supposedly didn’t exist and equated such laws to banning fishing because of the Loch Ness Monster:
MYSTAL: Having the second step of voter registration needlessly suppresses the votes for no real benefit. Some people might say, ‘oh, it prevents voter fraud.’ First of all, no, it doesn't! And second of all, voter fraud doesn't exist!
HOSTIN: Doesn’t exist! Right.
MYSTAL: If I say I want to go fishing somewhere and you say ‘you can't go fishing there.’ And I say, ‘why?’ ‘Because the Loch Ness Monster might getcha,’
“Shut up!” he shouted at the naysayers. “That's not a good reason to have a law.”
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read:
ABC’s The View
April 1, 2025
11:48:35 a.m. Eastern(…)
SUNNY HOSTIN: I love this book! You are dead on and it is a fantastic book! One of the laws you write about is playing out right now, the Immigration and Nationality Act. Now, this administration is using this statute to justify the detentions and possible deportations actually of visa and green card holders who they seem to deem a threat to U.S. foreign policy. What do you make of the administration's use of the act and more broadly, is Trump really setting up a First Amendment showdown, which is what Whoopi has been talking about?
ELIE MYSTAL: Yes, absolutely! One of my premises for the book is that every law passed before the 1965 Voting Rights Act should be presumptively unconstitutional. Right? Because before the 1965 Voting Rights Act we were functionally an apartheid country! Not everybody who lived here could vote here. So, why should I give a [self-censors] about some law that some old white man passed in the 1920s, like the Immigration and Nationality Act.
When they passed our fundamental immigration law, Congress said in real-time that they needed a law to prevent the, quote, “mongrelization” of the white race by the inferior races. Now, I look at that law and say, ‘I don't think that's so good.’ I don't think we should still be using it. But we are still using it today. That is the authority that Trump is using to criminalize people and pull people's visa cards, Marco Rubio, that comes from the 1956 update to the 1921 act.
Now, I personally do not think I can convince people to open their hearts and minds to immigration. I understand that in our failing country treating people with respect and decency and humanity is a controversial position!
[Applause]
And I cannot change their minds.
But we can dang sure make sure we're not putting people in jail for the crime of existing!
HOSTIN: Right!
MYSTAL: That we’re not putting people in jail for not filling out the form in triplicate in the right time and submitting it to the right agent. Immigration status offenses should not be criminal offenses, they should be civil offenses. We shouldn't be ripping people away from their families because they didn't fill out the paperwork correctly.
(…)
11:50:58 a.m. Eastern
ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN: So, what do you see as sort of the marginal changes that are actually really tangible and realistic that could be put in place the next few years?
MYSTAL: I argue that we should eliminate all voter registration laws. Now, that might not sound realistic to you but I promise you that it is. Because we already have voter eligibility requirements, right? An eligibility requirement would be like an age limit, right? 18 to vote, I might say you should be 16 but I’m not going to say eight! I have an 8-year-old who does knock but I've got an 8-year-old, right. We don't want them voting.
But once you meet the eligibility requirement, why can't you automatically be registered to vote? Having the second step of voter registration needlessly suppresses the votes for no real benefit. Some people might say, ‘oh, it prevents voter fraud.’ First of all, no, it doesn't! And second of all, voter fraud doesn't exist!
HOSTIN: Doesn’t exist! Right.
MYSTAL: If I say I want to go fishing somewhere and you say ‘you can't go fishing there.’ And I say, ‘why?’ ‘Because the Loch Ness Monster might getcha,’ like, that's -- shut up! That's not a good reason to have a law.
(…)
