Monday, on ABC’s “The View,” co-host Whoopi Goldberg criticized former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) for saying Black Lives Matter is “anti-American and it’s racist.”
Goldberg said, “Well, unfortunately, there wasn’t a lot of other balance in the world because, former Mayor — New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton are slamming the Black Lives movement. Giuliani claims it’s anti-American and inherently racist. Let me start by saying this, Rudy, if you look at who’s marching in those Black Lives Matter marches, they are all colors, … it’s men, women, black, white, green, orange. People are saying, we see an issue. We see a problem. So, telling us, particularly black folks, and particularly black parents, that we need to teach our children better, because they’re probably going to be killed by each other, is not the way to do this. Because we already know what we need to say to our children. This has been going on a very long time. But, it doesn’t help if you stir the pot, Rudy.”
She continued, this time addressing Bratton, “[I]t’s kind of not the thing you want to say. I would say you first. None of the people who were shot, not the police officers, not the people who were shot over the weekend, none of them were disrespecting the police. So, telling us to be nicer, to be quieter, is not going to work. You first, I say, be respectful. Understand why people are upset.”
Co-host Joy Behar said, “You know, the statement that he made on ‘Face The Nation,’ yesterday…his statement on ‘Face The Nation,’ Giuliani was, the real danger to black Americans, 99 out of 100 times, is other black kids who are going to kill them. I don’t — I think that’s a separate argument, first of all. He’s making a separate argument, but it also skirts the issue of racism, which is really the discussion people should be having in this country. What is racism in America? Not — it’s not about — a lot of times people sort of don’t understand, I think, what you’re driving at, what it means to be white in this country either. What it means to be white. People I’m talking to are white people now. I mean, I’m a white girl. I’m a Caucasian girl. I can move into any neighborhood I want. I can go to any school I want. I can travel in any country, where there’s no terrorism, of course, I’m scared of that. But I can go wherever I want. I’m not going to be followed thinking that I’m shoplifting, just because of the color of my skin. I think the people in this country need to understand that you have this privilege because of the color of your skin, and you need to get a little more sensitive to that fact, and when you start that, go there a little bit. You will probably start to understand what black Americans go through. I’ve seen this movie. I’m old. I’ve seen this movie. I saw it in the ’60s. I saw it in the ’70s. People make a little bit of progress, and then they go backwards again, and there’s never this understanding that schools need to be integrated, that people need to be living together.”
ABC Senior Legal Correspondent Sunny Hostin said, “[F]or Giuliani to tell me that I need to teach my kid to be more respectful, to police. Are you freaking kidding me? I teach my kid how to be respectful to police, because I need to save his life. I need to make sure he’s going to survive this.”
Goldberg added, “If you can’t see that there is an issue, if you don’t understand why people are marching, you are the problem. If you don’t see, that there are all kinds of folks marching in this, if you don’t put a face to them, you’re the problem, man, you are the problem. We’re all just trying to raise our kids, we’re all just trying to get through. We get that you don’t understand we’re trying to help you.”