‘The View’ Hosts Get Giddy Over Elon Musk Exit & Trump ‘TACO’ Nickname

Amanda Bell May 29, 2025, 11:49 am

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Whoopi Goldberg and Sara Haines on The View — ABC

The cohosts of The View were in a bit of a celebratory mood on Thursday (May 29) morning’s live show when discussing the first “Hot Topic” of the day. The subject was a two-parter, coupling the news that Elon Musk is now leaving the so-called Department of Government Efficiency — with public criticism of Donald Trump‘s “Big Beautiful” spending bill, no less — and that Trump was directly asked about Wall Street’s new nickname for his tariffs policy, TACO, which stands for “Trump Always Chickens Out.”

Whoopi Goldberg started the conversation out with a comedy beat at Musk’s expense. After Joy Behar joked that the show’s theme song (Leona Lewis‘ “This Version”) sounded like it was saying “virgin,” Goldberg said, “Speaking of virgins, Elon Musk is exiting his White House position as head of DOGE with some pointed remarks about his boss.” The live audience certainly understood the implication there and responded in kind with a swell of shocked laughter.

After rolling a clip of Musk saying he was “disappointed” by the bill, they went on to play a clip of the moment when a reporter asked Trump about the “TACO” nickname his trade policy is receiving from financial analysts on Wall Street, and he said, “Don’t ever say what you said. That’s a nasty question.”

Goldberg then said “TACO” was “better” than her usual “You Know Who” nickname for Trump, and Ana Navarro jumped in with joyous praise for the acronym.

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“[As if] I needed another reason to love tacos,” she joked. “And the karma here, the karma … because the attacks on Mexico have been endless, right? And this banning of anybody from the Oval Office that calls it the Gulf of Mexico, so it’s like tacos strike back.” She went on to detail exactly why the “TACO” thing is so successful saying, “For a nickname to be effective, there’s got to be truth to it, which this has: His trade policy is all over the place, it’s not written in stone, it’s like written on an invisible ink. And it’s got to get under the person’s skin, which it clearly did,” she explained. “When our audience first heard it, everybody burst out in laughter because it’s true and funny, and it gets under his skin.” She then erupted into a chorus, singing, Taco, taco, taco, taco, taco.”

Alyssa Farah Griffin then spoke up to detail why she thinks those two bits of news, plus a court’s decision to block Trump from imposing international tariffs, were good news for everyone. “I would argue this — hot take — these three pieces of news for Trump yesterday were both good news for Trump, but also good news for the country, and let me tell you why: DOGE and Musk going away is a good thing. The DOGE cuts were not a thorough, vetted, smart way, and I think that that can give people a little bit of ease that they’re not going to be coming for your Social Security and cutting willy nilly at different departments,” she said. “On tariffs, this is going to put a pause on some of the most sweeping ones that are already raising costs on Americans. So this is a good intervention of the courts. And then finally, this TACO bit: So basically, Wall Street analysts have decided that they’re calling his bluff, and that is good because it’s not going to give him the ability to create this massive market volatility, which we’ve seen him do, where people have lost tons of wealth and had our money wiped out in our retirement because they’re waiting him out, and they realize that he will fold. So this is actually all good from a place of just wanting general economic stability.”

Sara Haines focused on the “TACO” nickname, pointing out that Trump himself is notorious for calling people names. “He’s the king of nicknames. He’s been doing it for a nickname to come back at him and see how that feels a little bit,” she said. She also pointed out that The View‘s own cohosts have been predicting Musk’s exit for a while now (indeed, they called it back in February and again in April). “Alyssa said, what Donald Trump is going to do, he’s going to put Elon out there. Everyone’s going to hate on Elon, then he’s going to fire Elon. Here, it’s playing out, and Elon’s acting surprised.”

“I miss him a little, the way I miss menstrual cramps,” Behar joked of his departure from the federal government.

Behar then noted how certain Republican congresspeople have been criticized in town halls for their votes for the bill, like Mike Flood in Nebraska and Ashley Hinson in Iowa. “They both got booed and heckled. Every time these Republican guys go out there, they can’t really justify what’s in that ‘Big Beautiful Bill.'” Behar then proceeded to list out some of the highlights: “If it passed… it’s going to gut Medicaid. It’s going to gut food stamps. It’s going to roll back clean energy efforts — that means we can live in the smog. It’s going to shut down the Department of Education. It’s going to cut pensions for federal workers. That’s what it’s going to do. Why would you vote for that? Why don’t these Republican people want to breathe like the rest of us?”

The View, Weekdays, 11 a.m. ET, ABC