Rosie O'Donnell Admits She Had "A Bit Of A Crush" On Elisabeth Hasselbeck But Was Deeply Hurt By Her

March 26, 2019

If you’ve been watching The View for a long time, you probably remember the time when Rosie O’Donnell and Elisabeth Hasselbeck were co-hosts on the show.

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Rosie, unwavering in her liberal views, and Elisabeth, staunchly conservative, clashed a lot. Their feud peaked in May 2007, when they started a heated dispute about the Iraq War. Oh, how sparks flew!

Looking back at that epic argument, it’s easy to assume that the two women hated each other’s guts. But apparently, it wasn’t the case, as a new book about the show reveals.

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Rosie had a crush on Elisabeth

In Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of ‘The View’ by Variety’s Ramin Setoodeh, Rosie opened up about her true feelings towards Elisabeth. When she joined the show, Rosie saw her potential and wanted to be her mentor.

The comedian said:

Here’s what I said, ‘I’m the senior. She’s the freshman. I’ve got a really good player on the freshman team, but I have to teach her how to loosen up.’

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Rosie also admitted she had a platonic crush on her former co-host and speculated that Elisabeth may have had certain feelings for her, too:

I think this is something that will hurt her if you write it. She was the MVP of a Division 1 softball team for two years that won the finals. There are not many, in my life, girls with such athletic talent on sports teams that are traditionally male that aren’t at least a little bit gay.

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The comedian added that she didn’t have the urge to act upon her feelings in a romantic way:

There was a little bit of a crush. But not that I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to support, raise, elevate her, like she was the freshman star shortstop and I was the captain of the team.

That unforgettable fight the co-hosts had on live TV wasn’t just about politics. To Rosie, who was deeply offended by Elisabeth's refusal to defend her from conservative critics’ attacks, the argument was deeply personal:

It felt like a lover breaking up. The fight that we had, to me as a gay woman, it felt like this: ‘You don’t love me as much as I love you.’ ‘I’ve taken care of you.’ ‘You have not.’ ‘How could you do that to me?’ ‘I didn’t do anything to you.’

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They are not on speaking terms

Elisabeth actually attempted to contact Rosie and talk things out, but Rosie refused to talk to her. Anyway, Elisabeth has stood by her position that Rosie’s comments about American troops are indefensible:

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We wonder what she has to say about the newest revelation!