The hosts of “The View” are none too pleased with Joe Manchin, after he became the lone Democrat to vote against abortion protections this week. So, on Thursday, host Whoopi Goldberg called him out for it.
On Wednesday, Manchin sided with house Republicans, and voted against the Women’s Health Protection Act (WHPA) which would have codified abortion rights and eliminated some state laws that restrict a woman’s access to abortion ahead of the anticipated Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade. To Manchin, the WHPA “expands abortion. And with that, that’s not where we are today.”
“How do you know where we are today, Joe?” Whoopi sniped in response. “How do any of you guys know where we are today? None of you have any uteruses. You don’t have a vagina. You don’t have anything that goes to carrying or making decisions about babies.”
The moderator then marveled at the apparent lack of sympathy or empathy from those who voted to deny women more bodily autonomy.
“I don’t understand! It’s supposed to take care of women and this is — the response is like, so you just don’t give a hoot about what you just did. OK,” she added. “Everybody needs to just go vote these fools out of there. Just go vote.”
Guest host Alyssa Farah Griffin, a Republican who used to work in the Trump White House, did argue that “the vote yesterday was more extreme and went further than Roe v. Wade” but for the most part, agreed with Whoopi on the matter.
“This needs to be a conversation that’s led by women. It affects women, it doesn’t need to be a bunch of male lawmakers,” Griffin said. “The Matt Gaetzes of the world, I’m not here for your stupid takes.”
Griffin continued: “I will say this, as a Republican, my party needs to start — if we are in fact going to undo 50 years of precedent by overturning Roe, we need to invest in maternal care, paid parental leave, funding for rural health care, funding for foster care, etc.”
That said, things did get a bit heated between the hosts as they discussed who exactly will be affected by tighter abortion laws, and what can be done to help.
You can watch the full discussion from “The View” in the video above.