‘The View’: Jane Fonda Slams Abby Huntsman in Heated Discussion Following Recent Arrests

Jane Fonda appeared on The View this week, where she sat down for a discussion about pollution and climate change with co-hosts Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar and Abby Huntsman. With Meghan McCain sitting Tuesday’s episode out, that meant Huntsman was the only conservative voice on the panel who would offer any slightly different opinion than Fonda’s about what political action needs to be taken to conserve the planet.

Huntsman, 33, challenged Fonda, 81, who has made headlines for her recent arrests in Washington D.C. while protesting against climate change and advocating for the Green New Deal, on her methodology for drawing attention to the issue.

“But is there a way to do it without breaking the law? You think of all the peaceful protests that have led to change,” Huntsman said. “I worry about living in an uncivil society.”

Saying she “agreed” with Huntsman on principle, Fonda argued, “Climate activists have been doing this for 40 years. We’ve been writing articles and we’ve been giving speeches. We’ve been putting the facts out to the American public and politicians and we’ve marched and we’ve rallied peacefully, and the fossil fuel industry is doing more and more and more to harm us and our environment and our young people’s futures, and so we have to up the ante and engage in civil disobedience.”

Later, Huntsman told Fonda that while she believes action needs to be taken against pollution and climate change, she’s worried that “we’re not having a conversation in the country” about the issue because the two sides are so far apart. “I think part of the problem is this political hyperbole,” Huntsman said, “where you have [Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio Cortez] saying, don’t have kids anymore, or we shouldn’t ride on planes anymore, or this Green New Deal, where is that getting us?”

But Fonda interrupted her to sing the praises of Ocasio Cortez’s Green New Deal. “No, the Green New Deal is fantastic,” Fonda said. Huntsman argued that it’s “never going to happen in this country.”

“We, American taxpayers, subsidize the fossil fuel industry that’s killing us to the tune of $16 billion every year,” Fonda shot back. “I mean that is just, that’s criminal.”

She also suggested cutting the “totally bloated” military budget, which she said is “bigger than any other developed country,” to pay for both Medicare-for-All and the Green New Deal.

Fonda has been arrested four Fridays in a row for unlawfully demonstrating during her weekly demonstrations, which she calls Fire Drill Fridays. Last month, actor Ted Danson was also arrested while protesting. The week before, Fonda’s Grace and Frankie co-star Sam Waterston was arrested while protesting. Both arrests were the men’s first ever.

The actress has made it clear she intends on getting arrested as many times as it takes to get her climate change concern point across. “I will be on the Capitol every Friday, rain or shine, inspired and emboldened by the incredible movement our youth have created,” she previously wrote on her website.

Photo credit: Heidi Gutman / Contributor / Getty