Sunny Hostin Calls Out Biden's 'Unconscionable' Inaction on Voting Rights

Sunny Hostin did not come to play Tuesday morning as she delivered an impassioned monologue about President Biden's inaction on voting rights legislation. The co-host praised local groups for refusing to attend Biden's speech in Georgia today, as she believes his trip down south is "very performative," and his efforts would be better spent elsewhere. "It's just unconscionable, in my view, that it's a year later and we don't have voter rights legislation in place to protect the ballot!" said Hostin.

Hostin was first to speak up this morning, and she made sure to leave an impression on the panel. "Georgia did its job. Georgia delivered, especially led by folks like LaTosha Brown and Black Voters Matter," she said. "Georgia delivered by working during a pandemic, amidst great voter suppression during a pandemic, to turn out Black voters unlike Black voters had ever turned out. Not only in 2020, but also in 2021."

"It's a year after January 6 ... it's a year after Republicans' continued attack on our democracy," she continued. "And what we're hearing over and over again is, Joe Biden is just the president. He's not in charge of the Senate and he's not in charge of the House. Well, the limits of the presidency get mentioned all the time when Biden can't get it done, but the power of the presidency is on full display when he gets a win, like with infrastructure."

Hostin added that instead of traveling to Georgia, "the president and the vice president should be in West Virginia" and Arizona putting pressure on Sen. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema to support voting rights legislation. "And by the way, where is Mark Kelly, who's up for reelection in November?" she asked. "Where is he, Mr. Centrist? Because he now says he hasn't decided what he wants to do about the filibuster. He doesn't know what he wants to do about voter legislation. So, Mark Kelly's position is really reminding me of the white moderate that Martin Luther King Jr. reminded us of in his Letter From a Birmingham Jail in 1963. He thinks we should wait for justice. I don't think we need to wait for justice!"

BIDEN HEADS TO GEORGIA IN VOTING RIGHTS PUSH: As the president travels to make his case for historic voting rights reform and is expected to call for changes to the Senate’s filibuster rules, #TheView panel reacts to some allies saying he's too late. https://t.co/nLLeig5dAS pic.twitter.com/7V86Il2Xly

— The View (@TheView) January 11, 2022

The left-leaning co-host concluded by bringing things back around to Biden's speech. "I fully understand why there are a lot of voter rights groups that are not going to meet Joe Biden in Georgia," she said, "Because I don't really think he should be there!"

Elsewhere on The View... Though she didn't seem to agree with Hostin's criticism of Biden, Whoopi Goldberg pressed Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer about voting rights a few segments later. "I want to ask you this because it's irritating me to the n-th degree," she said. "Why are we still talking about my right as an American to vote? I feel like Black people, suddenly, still are back where we were under the Emancipation Proclamation. What is happening?! Why are we still fighting this this way? What's going to change?"

Schumer placed the blame on Trump's "Big Lie," and for the next 15 minutes, he discussed the importance of voting rights legislation without actually answering any of the co-hosts' specific questions. "I say to all of my colleagues, and my Democratic colleagues in particular," he said. "This is not just another political issue; this is about the future of how America functions. And if we allow voting rights to be rolled back, sort of like they were in Jim Crow, our democracy could really wither away."

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