‘The View’: Whoopi Goldberg Clarifies Her Comments About Spending Time in Jail

Whoopi Goldberg is setting the record straight about her statement that she has been to jail. After the longtime The View moderator told her co-hosts and viewers that she previously spent time behind bars during the ABC talk show’s newest segment “Drop the Topic” on Wednesday, Goldberg cleared the air surrounding the comment at the end of the episode, confirming that she was only joking.

“Don’t get it twisted, I’m a humorist. So stop looking it up, ’cause that’s what I know is happening,” Goldberg, 68, said at the close of Wednesday’s episode, confirming that she has not been to jail. “‘When was she in jail?’ You’ll be looking until the cows come home, honey!”

Goldberg sparked confusion among co-hosts Sara Haines, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, and Alyssa Farah Griffin — as well as viewers tuning in from home — earlier in the episode. As the long-running talk show debuted “Drop the Topic,” The View‘s newest segment in which the co-hosts choose a topic at random after deciding they didn’t like the original topic, the co-hosts were asked, “Would you rather hike the Appalachian Trail by yourself, or spend six months in jail?” While Haines quipped, “I’m considering jail right now,” after some consideration and Hostin, a former federal prosecutor, eventually concluded that she’d choose the hike, Goldberg shocked everyone when she admitted, “Well, I’ve done both.”

Goldberg’s statement immediately prompted plenty of questions, with Behar asking, “When were you in jail, Whoopi?” Goldberg, however, refrained from spilling any details, responding, “Doesn’t matter, does it?” before promising, “I’ll tell you about it.” She then quickly moved on from the topic.

“Well, you gave up a fairly good topic to talk about this,” Goldberg explained. “The other topic was about the man and the woman, the woman says she doesn’t like the kind of sex that her husband [has with her.] She calls it ‘vanilla sex.’ I said, ‘Well what kind of stuff are you looking for?’ They did not have an answer for that!”

The comedian and EGOT winner, who eventually clarified her statements when the show returned from commercial break, went on to give the woman some advice: “She should’ve just gotten herself something she could put a battery in. Put some googly eyes in it and talk to it and let it say whatever it needs to say – Yes, no, yes, no.”

While Goldberg may insist she has not spent time in jail, she has been arrested, at least according to past reports. The upcoming Sister Act 3 star was arrested at Berkeley, California’s University of California campus amid an April 30, 1985 protest, according to a New York Times syndication of an Associated Press story dated May 1, 1985. A separate article from the San Francisco Examiner, per Entertainment Weekly, reported that Goldberg was arrested alongside Berkeley’s then-mayor, Gus Newport, and two others for “blocking the entrance to University Hall.” The group reportedly appeared at the Berkeley Municipal Court before being “released after signing a promise to appear June 6 on the charge of blocking a public entrance.”