Former Trump Staffer Stephanie Grisham Calls for Civility on The View

Former Trump staffer Stephanie Grisham displayed a stunning lack of self-awareness Tuesday morning when she implored The View's co-hosts to stop disrespecting Republicans. After Joy Behar implied that many Trump supporters are "dumb," Grisham called for civility and an end to the name-calling, though she found herself at odds with the rest of the panel along the way. "We can't call people, Republicans, these names!" said Trump's former press secretary. "You can't denigrate my neighbors in the Midwest!"

While Grisham largely got along with the panel in her return to The View, things got tense during a discussion about Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene calling three of her fellow Republicans "pro-pedophile" for saying they will vote to confirm Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson. "People need to remember a couple of things," said Behar. "Sometimes I'll be looking online and I'll see conversations that some reporter is having with a Trump supporter, and they sound ludicrous to me. The things that come out of their mouths – one of them said that they thought George Bush was a Nazi. And then you think, 'How dumb is this woman?' Just remember one thing: she will be voting. She will be voting. So, everyone needs to vote, is the point. Otherwise we'll be sunk."

Behar has been much more critical about Trump supporters (and the former president) in the past, but Grisham didn't seem to approach the situation with that in mind. "The more we call people 'idiots,' even when they're saying these idiotic things, the more the right gets all — they close ranks and they double down, and they will come out voting, too," said the ex-Trump staffer.

"Silence is being complicit, Stephanie," replied Sunny Hostin. "And you've gotta call an idiot an idiot when you see the idiot! Because I think it's really taking down our country, mistruths."

"I'm not saying be silent. I'm saying don't call—" said Grisham, in a failed attempt to respond. She agreed that name-calling is "taking down our country," but refused to acknowledge that she or her former boss may have played a role in that downward spiral.

When Hostin insisted that "Marjorie Taylor Greene is an idiot" — to the point that "her picture is there" under the word in the dictionary – Grisham clarified that she's "talking about voters," not politicians.

Finally, Whoopi Goldberg cut in. "Do you think it's idiotic for a Republican to call one of the Bushes a Nazi?" asked the longtime moderator. "I think that it is not a smart answer," replied Grisham, who stood by her answer even as Whoopi and the rest of the panel laughed. "We can't keep attacking people because they double down and vote for those radicals! I think it was an uneducated answer. I'll leave it at that."

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