Elisabeth Hasselbeck Is Not Happy About Rosie O’Donnell’s Return To ‘The View’

There’s one person who isn’t particularly thrilled by Rosie O’Donnell’s possible return to The View and that’s former co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck. If this isn’t a no-brainer to you, then lets travel back a few years. It was back in 2007 when the two had spots on the panel of co-hosts on The View.

That’s about the only thing they did share as Rosie O’Donnell is a well-known liberal and Elisabeth Hasselbeck is a staunch conservative. The two were so polarizing that it all came to a head in an explosive fight that went viral and led to O’Donnell leaving the show after a short stint.

The fight started because O’Donnell disagreed with a lot of former President Bush’s policies, including the war on Iraq. During a previous episode, Rosie stated that with all of the Iraqi civilian deaths at the hands of the U.S. soldiers, they might be looked at as terrorists. Due to this comment, the TV host had received harsh backlash and didn’t feel like Elisabeth was sticking up for her.

It all came to a head when Rosie asked Elisabeth, “Do you believe I think our troops are terrorists?” Hasselbeck answered negatively, and a blow out happened live without the cameras pulling away. This fight led to O’Donnell cutting her contract short, and probably one of the most discussed moments of O’Donnell’s life.

Over the last two days, we’ve reported that with Barbara Walters off the panel, as well as Jenny McCarthy and Sherri Shepherd, Rosie O’Donnell has been negotiating to come back on The View and is near closing a deal. Hasselbeck, who’s currently on the conservative show Fox & Friends, wasn’t too happy about her return, but then again, she wasn’t really surprised either.

According to E!, Hasselbeck explained to her co-hosts Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade:

“I think this has been in the works for a long time.”

Hasselbeck thinks that Rosie’s return goes back to Barbara’s goodbye show.

“How odd is this, when you have the woman, who again, insinuated that our own troops were terrorists in Iraq at the time, then left the show…to have such ease the day of Barbara’s goodbye show was shocking to me? She walked around with a lot of control and I had the chance to talk to her.”

She continued:

“Rosie herself told me, on-set, while we were mic’ed up, that she produced the reunion show to have everybody together and it was her idea. Now, would you think that the woman who left in the way that she did would be producing Barbara’s goodbye show? Here’s the shocker: It was actually her hello show.”

As for what she thinks about Rosie O’Donnell possibly going head to head with Whoopi Goldberg, the former View co-host said:

“I don’t think it would be wise for Rosie O’Donnell to challenge Whoopi Goldberg on anything. I really don’t.”

It’s been rumored that Sarah Palin is looking to join the panel, so in our eyes O’Donnell will have the former Vice Presidential candidate to butt heads with and not the mild mannered Whoopi Goldberg.

[Images via Bing]