Key Points
- Whoopi Goldberg looked off camera to address unseen audience members for making noise.
- “Hold on, now, we’ve got an hour of the show,” Goldberg said at the top of an interview with Zohran Mamdani.
- The New York City mayoral candidate laughed at Goldberg’s playful scolding.
Whoopi Goldberg would very much like to be able to hear herself interview New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani on The View.
The EGOT-winning actress called out the talk show’s studio audience Wednesday morning, as she and her colleagues welcomed the liberal politician to the show’s Manhattan set to uproarious outbursts from those in attendance.
As the 33-year-old Mamdani — the son of Hollywood film director Mira Nair — made his way out to the Hot Topics table for an interview, the audience loudly cheered while he greeted cohosts Goldberg, Sara Haines, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, and conservative panelist Alyssa Farah Griffin (who has criticized him on the air in the past).
Toward the end of his introduction, a few audience members could be heard shouting supportive exclamations for Mamdani, before Goldberg turned in her seat to address them live on the air.
“Hold on, now,” Goldberg said, turning to face the unseen audience members, whom the camera did not cut to show.
Goldberg told them, “We’ve got an hour of the show” to do.
“So, y’all are going to have to calm down so we can talk to him,” Goldberg said, as Mamdani laughed in his seat.
The interview then carried on, with the cohosts asking Mamdani about everything from President Donald Trump‘s criticism of his politics, to Haines questioning him on how he’s answered inquiries about his feelings on the terrorist group Hamas in the recent past.
Griffin, who said on The View in June that she was “nervous” about Mamdani’s rise in support in New York City, also asked him about why he thinks more senior Democratic leaders haven’t yet endorsed him, as well as becoming, as she said, a “poster child for the GOP” attacks on socialist-leaning politics — including from her former boss, Trump.
Griffin called Kamala Harris’ support for Mamdani a “tepid endorsement,” and pointed out that leaders like Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries have been “reluctant to endorse” him in the mayoral race.
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“What I would say is that Donald Trump is going through the stages of grief. First, it was denial,” Mamdani said of the narrowing of the race, pointing to endorsements from people like New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, and “the fact that I wouldn’t be sitting here with you if it was endorsements that made all the difference, it was the people of this city.”
The View airs weekdays at 11 a.m. ET/10 a.m. PT on ABC.
