Joy Behar Reflects On “Rude” Moment When She Walked off ‘The View’ During Bill O’Reilly Interview 

Joy Behar is reflecting on one of her more infamous moments on The View. The longtime co-host shared what she was thinking when she got up and walked offstage during an interview with View guest Bill O’Reilly back in 2010.

During a conversation about party hosting etiquette on Thursday’s episode of the talk show, Behar flashed back to 13 years ago, when she and co-host Whoopi Goldberg were so fed up with their View guest that they left the stage altogether.

“I’m never rude to guests, unless you count the way I treated Bill O’Reilly one time on this show,” Behar said. “Whoopi and I, we walked off the stage on him.”

Sunny Hostin replied, “That wasn’t really rude, though. That was a lesson.”

Behar, slapping her hand down on the table in front of her, added, “That was a political move!” as Hostin agreed, noting, “That was a teachable moment.”

The heated exchange between O’Reilly, Goldberg and Behar occurred in October 2010 during a discussion about a proposed mosque at Ground Zero. As O’Reilly said the mosque would be “inappropriate,” Goldberg exclaimed, “Oh my god!” and threw her hands up, as Behar proclaimed, “I don’t want to sit here” and promptly got up, with Goldberg following behind.

Behar recently reflected on the moment during a January episode of The View while honoring late co-host and show creator Barbara Walters. Behar said that Walters “did not like” that she and Goldberg walked offstage.

“She said, ‘Why did you do that? You should sit there and take it on,’ and I said, ‘I couldn’t sit there. My behind propelled out of the seat from him,'” Behar remembered.

While Walters was not too pleased with her initially, Behar said her boss cooled down after seeing the positive side of the stunt: “But then, there was so much publicity around it, she was fine with that,” she said.

The View airs weekdays at 11/10c on ABC. Watch the segment from this morning’s episode in the video above.