Gretchen Carlson Praises Ron DeSantis' 'Savvy' Offer to Unvaccinated Cops

Former Fox News personality Gretchen Carlson has had a relatively quiet two days on The View, but she still managed to get in her conservative talking points Tuesday morning when she praised Gov. Ron DeSantis' efforts to get anti-vax police officers to move to Florida. While Carlson said she doesn't "necessarily agree" with DeSantis, she insisted his promise to give $5,000 bonuses to officers who move to Florida is "politically savvy," particularly in light of the "worker shortage crisis in America."

Interestingly, Carlson actually opened the Hot Topics segment by breaking from her party and insisting that the COVID-19 vaccine has been "politicized" to the point that even scare-tactic PSAs won't work on Trump supporters. "Under his administration, they put out the vaccine, and then they don't promote it to the people that follow," she said. "And that is where we are. We've politicized this whole thing, and I think it's a shame."

"And they snuck to get it. This is the other thing: they all got the vaccine!" added Goldberg. "They all got it," replied Carlson. "But didn't publicize it."

When Joy Behar asked "what should they do" to reach Trump supporters who have still not gotten vaccinated, Carlson said she's "in favor of the mandates" as a policy. "I think that actually, [Mayor Bill] de Blasio here in New York City should actually allow them to have a test-out option because that seems to be what a lot of places are doing," the former Fox News host said of disgruntled NYPD and other city officers. "That may be a way to keep the workers."

"Listen, we have a worker shorter crisis in America night now," continued Carlson. "So, DeSantis is being politically savvy — I'm not saying I necessarily agree with him — but he's savvy to offer $5,000 for those people to come down to Florida."

The co-hosts didn't engage with Carlson's specific point about DeSantis' police officer bonus, but Sunny Hostin was more than happy to correct her take on workplace issues. "Part of the 'worker shortage,' and I don't think it's getting enough coverage, is we won't raise the minimum wage, and we haven't been treating our workers well," said the co-host. "Those places that are giving people the appropriate wage, that are giving people health benefits, they're not having a problem attracting workers. The people that aren't treating their workers appropriately, those are the people that are having problems."

After some back and forth about the need to pass President Biden's economic agenda, Carlson returned to the topic of the vaccine. "The bottom line is: if Trump would've told people to get the vaccine, we would be done with this pandemic," she said, earning a round of applause from the audience. "That's the bottom line."

"Well, that's a whole other conversation," replied Whoopi Goldberg, always one to get in the last word. "I'm sorry to see you go if you're going down to Florida. I kind of feel if you stay down there and you're not vaccinated, you could die. It's that simple."

Claire Spellberg Lustig is the Senior Editor at Primetimer and a scholar of The View. Follow her on Twitter at @c_spellberg.