Sunny Hostin Shuts Down Sara Haines' 'Race-Neutral' SCOTUS Argument

Sunny Hostin offered Sara Haines a civics lesson Friday morning on The View as she shut down Haines' suggestion that the racial identity of President Biden's SCOTUS nominee is "just one part" of the equation. While Hostin was specifically criticizing conservatives advocating for a "race-neutral" approach to selecting a nominee, she used Haines' argument as a jumping-off point, asking, "Sara, what is wrong with the fact that because she is Black, that adds another perspective, and it actually is a positive thing?"

In a press conference yesterday, Biden reiterated his commitment to nominating a Black woman to the Supreme Court to replace retiring justice Stephen Breyer. "The person I will nominate will be someone of extraordinary qualifications, character, experience and integrity, and that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court," said the president. "I made that commitment during the campaign for president, and I will keep that commitment."

The women of The View praised Biden for upholding this promise, but they chastised conservatives for writing it off as "identity politics" and suggesting that a Black woman wouldn't be qualified for the job. "The implication, suddenly, is that there can't be a Black woman that's qualified," said Hostin. "If a Black woman graduated from Harvard and graduated from Harvard Law School — even in spite of the institutional racism, the systemic racism that occurs in this country, that is part of the very fabric of this country — she's probably over-qualified for any of these positions, and that is just the truth of it."

After Ana Navarro said that "all politics is identity politics," Haines chimed in to praise "the order" of Biden's remarks. "I loved how he talked, because he started with the integrity, the highly qualified, the character, and then he stopped and he goes, 'And she will be the first,'" she said. "That happens to be the identity because we need the representation. That is not the qualification. She will be highly beyond qualified to everyone."

REPUBLICANS TELL BIDEN NOT TO CHOOSE “RADICAL” JUSTICE: After Pres. Biden announced his commitment to choose a Black woman for SCOTUS to replace Justice Stephen Breyer, #TheView panel weighs in and reacts to Sen. Collins’ urging not to rush the process. https://t.co/wm7gLhW1VJ pic.twitter.com/8U1k1tRoPk

— The View (@TheView) January 28, 2022

A few minutes later, when Haines said that the race of Biden's nominee is "not the only thing she brings to the table," Hostin took issue with her point. "What I don't like is I'm hearing people say things like, 'Well, it should be race-neutral.' This country is not race-neutral!" said Hostin. "And so the fact that she is representing a community that is vastly underrepresented in the federal judiciary, that cultural point of view is a positive, it's an addition, and it's important not to erase that."

Joy Behar interrupted to say that it was time for a commercial, but Haines wanted to get the final word. "I would love when I get something for people who say that as a woman, I bring something to the table — but I also bring so many other things," she said. "I want it to be one thing I bring to a table, not the only part."

With that, Ana Navarro stepped in to back up Hostin. "Sara, there's not one woman of color who's achieved success — and there's three of us here — that hasn't been told at one point or another, 'You're just a token.' And so that's the point."

Elsewhere on The View... Lisa Ling highlighted our recap of Tuesday's show during a discussion about avoiding negative social media comments. To be clear, the piece wasn't meant as a dig, but rather as a reaction to the five-way cross-talk that erupted after Ling repeatedly called for Biden to "apologize to the American people" for calling Fox News' Peter Doocy a "stupid son of a bitch" on a hot mic. Regardless, tag us next time, Lisa!

lmao lisa ling just put my article about tuesday's episode on the view's big screen https://t.co/iAilyyWYbz pic.twitter.com/82kt0cRXMt

— Claire Spellberg Lustig (@c_spellberg) January 28, 2022

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