Pamela Anderson‘s September 6 appearance on The View turned political when co-host Meghan McCain started grilling her about her friendship with Julian Assange. McCain referred to the Wikileaks founder as a “cyberterrorist” for leaking classified information obtained by Chelsea Manning, as well as 250,000 more pieces of privileged information between 2010 and 2016. Anderson was saying that Assange, who was arrested on April 11 on conspiracy charges, has inspired her as an activist, and that powerful people are trying to silence him.
McCain jumped on that, saying Ecuador kicked him out of their embassy in London, where he had been living since 2012 under political asylum, because he was “defecating everywhere.” She’s referring to the embassy’s claim that Assange was “rude and disrespectful” and never cleaned up after his cat. Anderson shot back that the claim is a “smear campaign — that’s not true. She asked McCain what she would do if she were locked up for six years. “Well, I wouldn’t be a cyberterrorist, which he is,” The View co-host replied. “He hacked information. His leaks included classified documents that put our national security at risk, our military and the lives of spies and diplomats at risk.”
Co-host Joy Behar, who consistently spars with McCain over their political views, was actually on her side during this argument. “He put people in danger by refusing to redact sensitive information including Social Security numbers and other private material,” Behar said. “He’s a cyberterrorist. I’ll say it! I’ll say it!” McCain shouted at the end of Anderson’s segment. “I’m not going to stand by this. It’s ridiculous.”
This is the second controversy stirred up by McCain in just one week. On the first episode of The View‘s 23rd season, on September 3, she angered viewers by defending AR-15 owners, shortly after a gunman used one to randomly shoot people on the street in Texas, including a 17-month-old girl. She even said that she “couldn’t live without guns” and challenged Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke, a former Texas congressman, to come take hers away.