Washington: Prominent stars Meghan McCain and Pamela Anderson sparred over WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Friday’s episode of ‘The View’.
The spat broke out after McCain labeled Assange as a “cyber-terrorist.”
The conversation between the two women became heated after Anderson, who has lent her full support to the WikiLeaks founder on several occasions, defended him when asked about the Ecuadorian Embassy’s decision to revoke its asylum, reported People.
“When you visited him, he was allegedly kicked out of the Ecuadorian Embassy because he was defecating everywhere and creating messes,” McCain told Anderson, who responded, “No, that’s a smear campaign.”
“There was video,” McCain countered.
“What would you do if you were locked in a prison for six years?” the 52-year-old Anderson asked.
“I wouldn’t be a cyber-terrorist, which he is,” McCain fired back. Anderson outrightly disagreed with the host and said, “He’s not a cyber-terrorist.”
“He hacked information. His leaks included information that put our national security at risk, our military, the lives of spies,” McCain said passionately.
“War crimes need to be punished and they haven’t. The war crimes that he’s exposed, no one’s done anything about it. But they put him in jail to shut him up. And it’s not just America. He’s exposed Russia, he’s exposed all sorts of different countries,” Anderson continued.
The 48-year-old founder was arrested in April after London’s Ecuadorian Embassy withdrew asylum.
Assange had taken refuge there for around seven years, in order to avoid deportation to Sweden over a rape allegation, which he has continuously denied. The alleged hacker is also wanted by the United States for charges pertaining to WikiLeaks’ publication of classified information.
Apart from McCain, her co-host Joy Behar also raised questions on Assange’s intentions on Friday’s episode, asking Anderson, “A lot of people think Assange conspired with Russia by leaking hacked emails, which hurt Hillary Clinton. Is he responsible for giving us Trump?”
“I can see that because of the timing, but Hillary Clinton is responsible for Trump,” Anderson answered.
“No. No! I was with him. He wasn’t helping Trump, he was trying to tell the American people true information that Hillary Clinton was doing so people could make an educated choice. And I think FBI kind of put the nail in that coffin,” she continued.
“But do you mean to tell me he had nothing on Trump?” Behar asked. “If he had something on Trump, he would have put it out there,” Anderson countered.
McCain rejoined the conversation arguing, “He released her emails.”
“It was her emails. She wrote them,” Anderson said.