Meghan McCain was “warned” that The View was a “cesspool,” she said this week, by none other than former host Rosie O’Donnell.
“I know she’s in Ireland and has sort of banished herself from America,” the conservative podcast host said of O’Donnell’s recent escape from America on a new episode Michael Malice’s Your Welcome podcast, but “I always had really great interactions with her, for whatever that’s worth.”
One of those interactions concerned the show they’d both exited after on-air conflicts with their co-hosts. O’Donnell was “actually the first person that warned me that The View was a cesspool,” she revealed. McCain joined the daytime talk show as its token conservative host in 2017 and stayed until 2021.
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O’Donnell was the show’s moderator from 2006 to 2007 until she left on account of personal issues. She was asked back in 2014 and hosted briefly again before leaving for good.
In 2023, she told Brooke Shields on Now What? Podcast that hosting the show “was not something I’d ever do again.” O’Donnell cited her conflict for conservative co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck as one of the main reasons, as she shared she felt was “thrown under the bus” during their infamous on-air quarrel over the Iraq War. She shared those grievances at least in part with McCain during a conversation that Entertainment Weekly reports happened during intermission at a Broadway production of Frozen in 2018, not long after McCain joined the show.
O’Donnell, one of Trump’s many archnemeses, may not seem like someone McCain, who has a more favorable view of the president, would support. But she sang her praises during the Wednesday show.
“I think people relate to her and I think it’s because she’s been very open about struggles. I think her kids have struggled a lot publicly. She’s obviously not skinny either. I think she’s just been through a lot and is very open,” McCain continued. “I think she’s just been through a lot and is very open and I think if you’re raw and open, people will respond to it.”
As she discussed relatability, McCain broached the subject of nepotism and how she believes she’s seen by others because of her famous John McCain. “The View audience, it’s not a wealthy audience,” she said, “It’s a middle to lower class, stay-at-home mom-type,” going on to explain how she has tried to make herself more relatable in this “very populist” moment, as she described it. She said she’s “very aware of the fact that every room” she walks into, people see her as a “spoiled nepo baby.”
“Having a last name is actually a detriment now,” she continued. “It’s something I’ve been told by political strategists, people don’t like it. People think you’ve been handed everything. I’m not ashamed, but I certainly am very aware of the tone of the country right now, if that makes sense. It’s not cool to come from money at all.”
