ABC's 'The View' hosted just one conservative guest before Election Day, MRC study finds
ABC News' "The View" hosted just one conservative guest and 21 liberal guests in the weeks leading up to Election Day, according to a new study by the conservative media watchdog Media Research Center (MRC).
The study found that from Sept. 8, the start of Season 30, through Nov. 3, "The View" invited 21 liberal guests who were either critical of President Donald Trump or the Republican Party, with Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, being the lone conservative guest.
Four of the guests classified as liberal were politicians: Gov. Andy Beshear, D-Ky.; Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz.; Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who appeared on the show the day before Election Day alongside liberal podcast host Kara Swisher.
Although a retiring Republican senator, Tillis was included in the liberal guest count due to being invited on to discuss his anti-Trump book, "How to Lose Friends and Antagonize Presidents."
Tillis has been vocal in calling for Secretary of War Pete Hegseth's firing and has publicly broken with the president over the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill. In his book, Tillis wrote that he hoped Republicans would learn from midterm losses, which he predicted when the book was released in early October.
"What I hope is that members of my party take the loss and learn something," he wrote, according to The New York Times, "specifically that putting party affiliation — or loyalty to one man — before your own conscience never turns out well in the end."
The show hosted several liberal celebrities as well, including Maisie Williams, Ethan Hawke, Chelsea Handler, Michael Douglas, Billy Crystal, Patricia "Ms. Pat" Williams-Lee, D.L. Hughley, Chandra Wilson, Busy Philipps, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Eisa Davis, Jamie Lee Curtis and Sophia Bush.
Neil deGrasse Tyson and Stephen A. Smith were among the other guests included in the study. Smith appeared on the show to discuss his recent White House meeting with Trump, a decision that drew criticism from the co-hosts. He defended his decision to attend. The ESPN host also criticized the president during the appearance.
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According to the study's methodology, guests had to express liberal or conservative views during their appearances on the talk show to be counted in either category.
"If a celebrity did not discuss politics, they were not included in the count of political leanings even if they had a history of being outspoken in the past," the MRC said.
The show hosted 56 guests in total between Sept. 8 and Nov. 3, according to the study.
The daytime talk show drew scrutiny in 2025 after hosting 128 liberal guests over the course of the year and just two conservatives. In 2026, the show hosted Vice President JD Vance and Alina Habba, a former legal spokesperson for Trump. The show also had several Republican fill-in co-hosts while Alyssa Farah Griffin was on maternity leave. The fill-ins included Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Savannah Chrisley, among others.
In January 2026, the co-hosts interviewed former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican who became a fierce Trump critic.
"The View" did not immediately return Fox News Digital's request for comment.
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MRC President David Bozell said in a statement, "ABC has learned nothing from the FCC’s continued scrutiny. 'The View' continues to insult the intelligence of the American public by passing off pure Democratic propaganda as a ‘bona fide news program.’"
"With 21 anti-Republican voices and a single conservative in the two months before the midterms, ABC’s political agenda could hardly be more obvious," he continued. "And ABC is hardly alone. The entire elitist media landscape deserves serious scrutiny. The Federal Communications Commission must hold ABC accountable for its abuse of the public airwaves for partisan political purposes."
The program has faced a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) investigation over the past year. ABC has responded by defending "The View" as a "bona fide news" program.
The investigation is related to the agency's crackdown on equal-time requirements for political candidates. A source at the FCC told Fox News Digital in February that the show's interview with James Talarico triggered the probe.
"'The View' has been broadcasting under a bona fide news exemption granted to it more than twenty years ago ... The Commission has taken no action over the last two decades to modify or overturn the Declaratory Ruling and there is no basis for doing so now," ABC said in a petition in May in response to the FCC's probe.
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The co-hosts interviewed Texas Sen.-elect James Talarico on Wednesday after he won his election in Texas and interviewed Michigan Sen.-elect Abdul El-Sayed on Thursday after his election victory.
Republican Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who won her re-election campaign, is going to appear on the program next week.