“The View” cohost Whoopi Goldberg claimed on Wednesday that decorated Army veteran Pete Hegseth — President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Defense Department — wanted to “get rid of women.”
Goldberg and her cohosts on the ABC midday talk show complained that Hegseth wanted to disqualify people from serving in the military, arguing that was a bad idea when the armed services were already facing a recruitment crisis.
WATCH:
While lying about Pete Hegseth's position about women in the military (falsely claim he doesn't women there at all, when he was was talking about frontline infantry), Whoopi Goldberg suggests he and people like him want to eliminate women from the American population. pic.twitter.com/P0VYrfJB1W
— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 4, 2024
Goldberg appeared to take issue with statements Hegseth has made — specifically his argument that women should not serve in direct combat roles — and exaggerated that to falsely claim that he did not want women to serve in the military at all.
“Here you’re telling people, ‘Oh, you’re not qualified, you’re not qualified,'” Goldberg said, her tone condescending. “That does not seem to be a good way to keep people in a VOLUNTEER ARMY.”
As the audience laughed and applauded, cohost Alyssa Farah Griffin noted that the military was already facing a crisis with regard to low recruitment numbers — implying that Hegseth’s position on the issue would only serve to worsen that crisis.
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“The U.S. military has a recruitment crisis, we need more people to volunteer, including women,” Griffin said.
“A recruitment crisis among men, especially,” cohost Sunny Hostin added, apparently suggesting that the military needed more women to make up for the deficit in male recruits.
“Don’t worry, we got you. The women got you,” Goldberg crowed. “You know, when you get rid of us — if you get rid of the women, you getting rid of half the population. That’s not a smart move to make.”
Hegseth has never argued against women in the military in general, but has said that certain combat roles should be reserved for men only.
“I’m straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles,” he said on “The Shawn Ryan Show,” adding, “It hasn’t made us more effective, hasn’t made us more lethal, has made fighting more complicated. We’ve all served with women and they’re great, just — our institution don’t have to incentivize that in places where traditionally — not traditionally, over human history — men in those positions are more capable.”
