ABC Suspends Whoopi Goldberg From The View Over “Hurtful” Holocaust Comments

Whoopi Goldberg has been suspended by ABC’s The View following controversial comments Goldberg made during Monday’s episode about Jewish people and the Holocaust with the controversy continuing following Goldberg’s appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Goldberg’s suspension will be for two weeks.

“Effective immediately, I am suspending Whoopi Goldberg for two weeks for her wrong and hurtful comments,” ABC News president Kim Godwin said in a statement Tuesday night (via The Hollywood Reporter). “While Whoopi has apologized, I’ve asked her to take time to reflect and learn about the impact of her comments. The entire ABC News organization stands in solidarity with our Jewish colleagues, friends, family and communities.”

“These decisions are never easy, but necessary,” the statement continued. “Just last week I noted that the culture at ABC News is one that is driven, kind, inclusive, respectful, and transparent. Whoopi’s comments do not align with those values.”

On Monday’s episode of The View, Goldberg discussed the decision of a Tennessee school district to pull the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel Maus due to “inappropriate language” and nudity. In her comments, Goldberg claimed that the Holocaust “isn’t about race” and instead is about “man’s inhumanity to man.” When co-host Ana Navarro noted that it was also about “white supremacists going after Jews,” Goldberg replied to Navarro that those were “two white groups of people. The minute you turn it into race it goes down this alley. Let’s talk about it for what it is. It’s how people treat each other. It doesn’t matter if you’re Black or white, Jews, it’s each other.” The totality of Goldberg’s comments drew immediate backlash from viewers.

During her appearance on The Late Show, while Goldberg did apologize and state that she didn’t intend to offend, she attempted to clarify her view on race. Goldberg later issued an apology on social media on Monday and again apologized on Tuesday’s episode of The View.

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“Yesterday on the show I misspoke,” Goldberg said to open the talk show. “[The Holocaust] is indeed about race, because Hitler and the Nazis considered the Jews to be an inferior race. Now, words matter, and mine are no exception. I regret my comments and I stand corrected. I also stand with the Jewish people.”