ABC News made a big deal of their extensive, months-long search for someone to fill their “conservative” seat, so one would think presenting a diversity of opinion on The View would be a priority. But a new NewsBusters study showed that it’s more than just a name. “The View” also represented the fact that only one view, the liberal view was permitted; they were exposed by the fact that in the first three months of 2025, they had ZERO right-leaning guests on the program to talk politics.
Since coming back after their winter break on January 6, through April 4 (the Friday before the 6th), The View had 63 guests on to discuss politics and they all expressed left-leaning view points. During that same period, there were ZERO guests that expressed right-leaning politics.
Of those 63 left-leaning guests, 9 were Democratic politicians: Sen. Tammy Duckworth (IL), Sen. John Fetterman (PA), Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (MI), Sen. Elizabeth Warren (MA), Rep. Jasmine Crockett (TX), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (MN), Gov. JB Pritzker (IL), Sen. Elissa Slotkin (MI), and Sen. Chuck Schumer (NY).
Four of them were former staffers of Democratic presidential administrations: the Obama-era hosts of Pod Save America (Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, and Tommy Vietor), and Karine Jean-Pierre, President Biden’s press secretary.
The rest were a medley figures from Hollywood (e.g. John Leguizamo, Michelle Yeoh, and Ellen Pompeo), comedy (e.g. Roy Wood Jr., Chelsea Handler, and Bill Burr), tech (e.g. Bill Gates and Kara Swisher), T.V. (e.g. the cast of Queer Eye), and influencers (e.g. Elie Mystal, Dylan Mulvaney, and Stephen A. Smith).
January 6 marked the beginning of the second half of The View’s 28th season; a season that was kicked off with guests such as liberal U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA).
According to The View’s ticket request page, upcoming guests with overtly political stances included journalist Ezra Klein, NYU Stern Professor Scott Galloway, and Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA). Not a single Republican politician nor celebrity with right-leaning politics was on the list. And to kick off the week just outside the study's date parameters (April 7), The View invited Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ).
The beginning of the second Trump administration was obviously triggering to the cast when examining their guest appearances. Prior to the inauguration on January 20, they only had 5 people on to discuss liberal politics. Post-inauguration, there was a deluge of liberal guests (54) between January 21 and March 24, after which there were only 4 overtly liberal political discussions through April 4.
Recent comments from the show’s primary moderator, Whoopi Goldberg made it clear that the show was meant to be a vector to get Democratic talking points to the public.
During an appearance on the show by sports commentator Stephen A. Smith (noted above), Goldberg argued with Smith about the Democratic Party’s efforts in messaging themselves to voters in 2024 and defended The View’s role in that effort:
SMITH: [Y]ou're talking about what he's doing. But before you brought that up you brought up the message that the Democratic Party was disseminating. I'm challenging you on that. That is not what they were doing.
GOLDBERG: Oh, yes, it was. I was here. We did it.
When teeing up a Hot Topics discussion about the future of the Democratic Party’s leadership and responding to comments by Gov. Tim Walz (MN), Goldberg said: “I don't know if you can wait for somebody to step up and lead the party. [Tim Walz] is not wrong when he says the party is us and what are we going -- what are we prepared to do?”
The last-time The View spoke with a Republican politician that didn’t hate President Trump was former Gov. Chris Sununu (NH) on August 1, 2024; and before that it was Rep. Nancy Mace on October 2, 2023. Both in the show’s 27th season.
As detailed in a December 2023 exclusive from NewsBusters, The View rejected requests from Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz to come on the show and promote his book at the time. It may have had something to do with his previous appearance in 2022, when he pulled out literal receipts about the Democratic Party’s election denialism of the 2016 presidential election results and their weaponization of the Justice Department.
The View’s rhetoric against Republicans didn’t make it an appealing place to want to visit even if they were invited.
In 2024, Goldberg had attacked Trump’s grandkids for humanizing him; she told viewers “don’t fall for that,” possibly suggesting Trump wasn’t a human being. They defended their continued use of incendiary rhetoric against Trump, even after the attempts on his life. And they recently defended “comedian” Amber Ruffin who suggested Trump and his supporters were not human beings; even inviting the “comedian” on the show.
Against Republicans in general, they’ve denounced the GOP’s “very dark vision” for America and “ominous” traditional values. Going beyond just disagreeing on policy, the show’s Friday moderator, Joy Behar had claimed Republicans make “a lot of money off children’s deaths” via mass shootings. They’ve also claimed the only way the right wins elections was by “cheating.” And they’ve called leading Republicans figures literal “terrorist[s].”
The View has also hosted far-left extremists who were welcomed to use the show to fantasize about murdering people on the right, like pro-lifers and conservative Supreme Court justices.
The cast’s liberal politics were also further afield than some of their side’s politicians. Co-host Sunny Hostin demanded Democrats be willing to “fight and die” for their rights like older generations. And they lashed out at Schumer, during his appearance, for choosing to not shut down the government.
Methodology: For a guest to be counted as either liberal or conservative, they needed to express such views during their appearance on The View. If a celebrity did not discuss politics, they were not included in the count of political leanings even if they had a history of being outspoken in the past. For example, actor Robert De Niro had a history of speaking out against President Trump, but was not included in the liberal count because politics did not come up.
