‘The View’: Whoopi Goldberg Has a Message for JD Vance About Young Republicans’ Racist Texts Reaction

Amanda Bell October 16, 2025, 11:40 am

The View cohosts had a lot to say about the bombshell Politico report about Young Republican leaders’ leaked texts containing racist, anti-Semitic, and misogynistic screeds, as well as JD Vance‘s attempt to dismiss the severity of the issue.

After reviewing footage of Vance reacting to the release by saying, “Grow up. I’m sorry. Focus on the real issues. Don’t focus on what kids say in group chat. The reality is that kids do stupid things, especially young boys. They tell edgy, offensive jokes, like that’s what kids do, and I really don’t want us to grow up in a country where a kid telling a stupid joke, telling a very offensive, stupid joke, is caused to ruin their lives, and at some point we’re all gonna have to say enough of this B.S.”

Whoopi Goldberg started off the discussion by clarifying, “So just so we’re clear, some of the members in this chat are between the ages of 24 and 35, so they’re not kids… So these are adults. And I have to say, is this the way you want young Republicans represented in this country?”

Alyssa Farah Griffin was the first to answer by saying, “No,” and revealing that she was once in leadership for a similar group and would have fired anyone saying similar things before adding, “I think that speaks to two things. There is a dark underbelly in our politics that has allowed racism, it’s allowed hate, it’s allowed misogyny, and we’ve just kind of normalized it on the right, and there’s not enough folks who are willing to just call it out for what it is. And then secondarily, there is this crisis of young men. This is almost universally Young Men of a Certain Age. I don’t want to stereotype them, but they don’t look like guys who have a lot of friends, who are have girlfriends, have intimate relationships. I don’t mean this to be mean, but the facts speak for themselves. If you don’t have community, and you live online, mostly, you can be radicalized to hate people you don’t engage with, people you don’t have empathy for people. It’s very scary, and leaders need to wake up to it.”

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Joy Behar then piped in with a timely joke, saying, “We’ve said this on the show that the frontal lobe does not get developed until you’re 25. What’s Trump’s excuse?” She then had a more serious tone and said, “The Republican Party needs to deal with this. They need to find their better selves, find their better angels.”

Sunny Hostin, for one, was ready to play the told ya so game. “I hate to say it, but I’m not surprised that that chat exists… They checked every white supremacist bigot box. They were antisemitic, they were misogynistic, they were homophobic, they were racist. It was stupid. They were dumb. But my lived experience as an afrolatina in this country helps me tell the uncomfortable truth about this country with real clarity, and that’s why I wasn’t surprised. And I think many people would like to deny that lived experience. I’ll say it again, because I’ve said it on the show many times. Trump’s rise, in part, was based in racism and white supremacy. Remember, those of us who said that, when I said that, and those of my friends that said that, were accused of hyperbole and racism ourselves. I wish that wasn’t true, but it is true. And when I say things like that, when I say that white supremacy is thriving on the right, when I say the future of the Republican Party embraces white supremacy, please believe me the first time, and only look at this chat as your proof that it is alive and well in the Republican party.”

Haines also criticized the VP for his reaction, saying, “I think it’s dangerous that JD Vance would conflate sophomoric, immature behavior with pernicious, vile, unacceptable [words].”

When Griffin then tried to deflect by pointing to the leaked messages of a Democratic office candidate who reportedly ideated violence against Republicans, Goldberg brought the issue back to the beginning.

“Here’s the bigger problem. If you can’t admit that there is a problem at all, this is part of the reason why women and gay folks and folks of a different hue get so angry. It’s because the vice president isn’t denouncing this. He is a man who is married to an Indian woman… And I want to say to him, if you read these, JD, would you be comfortable saying to your wife, get over it or calling it a joke, or calling it not funny? It’s not. There’s nothing funny about this. And let me just say one more thing, because people need to remember, a lot of those jokes went away because the people they were being made about did not like them and stopped going to see the people who were telling? When you recognize that your audience is diminishing, you’ve got to look at your material, and if your material is bad, it’s telling you go taller, do better.”

“Since when is racism, antisemitism, bigotry, homophobia, funny?” Hostin pondered.

“It never was,” Haines answered.

“It wasn’t funny for years to people,” Goldberg agreed.

When Haines then noted that one of the people involved in the texts issued an apology, Goldberg said it was “too late” and added, “When you get caught doing something, when you get caught with your pants down, the thing is not to explain why your pants are down, the thing is to pull your pants up.”

The View, weekdays, 11a/10c, ABC