Whoopi Goldberg Calls for Constitutional Amendment Barring Convicted Criminals from Being President

Whoopi Goldberg told her co-hosts Thursday on ABC’s “The View” that there needs to be a constitutional amendment barring convicted criminals from serving as president of the United States.

Goldberg said, “What really was started to freak me out is the idea that we’re not even discussing changing the Constitution to make it say you cannot be in jail while being the president.”

Co-host Sunny Hostin said, “An amendment would be nice.”

Goldberg said, “I’m a big fan of amendments. I feel like unless we start to plug these holes, this is going to keep biting us in the behind. It really is going to take people saying, hey, listen, if I can’t vote when I come out of jail, why can you be president.”

Hostin said, “That’s a wonderful point. Amendments are very American. You know, I mean, some people argue the Constitution is not a breathing and living thing. It’s sort of stagnant. I feel differently. I feel it’s a living and breathing thing. We didn’t have cell phones before. We don’t know there would be AR-15s.”

Goldberg said, “It has to grow with the country. What has happened, I know this is weird, but I’ve been having strange thoughts. What I think has happened for us as a nation is over the past ten years weird stuff has been happening in the country to show us where the problems are. I think the fact that we have this situation now with you-know-who is there to tell us, hey, y’all have a problem and these kinds of things are going to start coming up because these kinds of people, people who are not reading the Constitution, don’t know the law, don’t know how this country runs are now starting to get in.”

She added, “An amendment will change how we deal with people who come up like this.”

Co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin said, “The bar is high for a constitutional amendment. I think it warrants it in this case. It would force a state like Texas to be on the record do you think that somebody who is a convicted felon should be able to hold office? I believe in restoring felons voting rights. I don’t believe you should be able to run for president if you’re in jail.”

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