Whoopi Goldberg wasted no time when The View returned for its 29th season on Monday. The longtime co-host ripped into Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after his rocky Senate hearing last week, where he was grilled from both sides of the aisle about his vaccine stance.
“They’re playing Russian roulette with the lives of children,” Goldberg said during the live broadcast, slamming Kennedy for canceling $500 million in mRNA vaccine contracts and surrounding himself with vaccine skeptics on his advisory committee, reported HuffPost.
To make her point, Goldberg pointed to what happens in schools every year. “Any time you go to a school, it is a — who knows what’s in there? They sneeze, everybody gets sick. You think you’re dying, you know, but you’re not, you just got hit by kid stuff. We know that this happens,” she explained.
“There are reasons that people put these mandates in place. Now, you want to get rid of all of them? You’re basically saying, ‘Let’s see what happens if your kid goes to school with other kids.’ And your grandparents, who are elderly, are in with your grandkids. So now, you’re saying, y’all don’t care.”
Goldberg has been critical of Kennedy before. Back in February, she blasted him for brushing off a measles outbreak in Texas as “not unusual.” At the time, she warned viewers that people could die if they believed his words and failed to protect themselves.
On Monday’s show, she also backed up Joy Behar, who called out four Republican senators with medical degrees who still voted to confirm Kennedy. Goldberg said those lawmakers “all made a decision to follow a road that has a nine-million-foot drop.”
“These are things that you can control,” she continued, referring to vaccines. “You can’t control a lot of stuff that’s happening but these are the little things that you can take in hand and grab and say, ’I’m not putting up with this BS! I’m just not going to do it.′ This is on us, this is what we’re learning.”
Goldberg then wrapped her comments with a blunt reminder about accountability. “Our government, I don’t know where they are. But I know where I am, you know where you are. And it is now our responsibility to take heed to what is going on in our lives.”
The fiery segment set the tone for The View’s new season, keeping with its long tradition of jumping straight into politics and controversy. And if Monday’s opening show was any sign, Goldberg is not backing down from calling out what she sees as dangerous decisions from leaders in charge of public health.