Meghan McCain Announces She Is Leaving 'The View'

Meghan McCain announced she is leaving "The View" at the top of the ABC show Thursday. "So I am just going to rip the Band-Aid off. I am here to tell all of you, my wonderful co-hosts and the viewers at home, that this is going to be my last season here at 'The View.'"

McCain and her husband, Ben Domenech, have a baby girl named Liberty and she said she wants to raise in her in Washington D.C., where she lived during the pandemic.

"When I think about where I want Liberty to have her first steps, her first words, I just have this really wonderful life here that ultimately I didn’t want to leave," McCain said. She does not want to move back to New York where the show is based.

"This was not an easy decision. COVID has changed the world and caused me to look at my life," said McCain. "This is the best political show. It is not easy to leave."

"The View" continued during the pandemic with co-hosts working and interacting from their homes. McCain said at first she did not want to join the show but her late father, John McCain encouraged her to reconsider. McCain is considered the conservative voice on the show and often sparred with the more liberal co-hosts Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar. She will remain on the show until the end of this season at the end of July.

Goldberg praised her work on the show and said she will be missed. "It has been quite wonderful to sit across from you," said Goldberg. McCain called her co-hosts, "the most talented women on all of television."

Behar said, "I really, really appreciated that you were a formidable opponent," adding, "You’re no snowflake, missy!" She also noted that despite "our disagreements and our fights," they had positive moments together including going out drinking together.

McCain is the show’s second longest running conservative co-host on the show. Elisabeth Hasslebeck had the longest on "The View" from 2003 -1013.

"My final note to the world watching, the show will continue, the show will probably be here ... long after we're all long gone," McCain said, according to The Hill. "The media needs to do a better job of covering the women on this show in general. As Joy pointed out, it is not a fair fight. We are covered with deep misogyny and sexism by the media."

ABC wanted McCain to remain on the show. She has two years remaining on her contract.

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