Whoopi Goldberg Slams Florida Lawmakers for 'Playing Russian Roulette with Children's Lives' Over Vaccine Mandate Ban

The View returned for Season 29 on ABC, and the hosts didn't hold back in their discussion of the hottest topics.

In recent days, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo announced plans to ban vaccine mandates for schoolchildren, including for measles and polio. Ladapo called these mandates "wrong" and infamously likened them to "slavery," which sparked outrage from co-host Ana Navarro during the show's initial "Hot Topics" segment.

"Why does he have to make that comparison to slavery? This is a man who was born in Nigeria, where millions and millions of people were brought across the Atlantic and shackled and taken into slavery," Navarro fumed. "Stop re-litigating slavery in this country, d-----! Stop comparing it to anything else."

Returning as moderator, Whoopi Goldberg did not shy away from controversy either. She accused Ladapo, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — who has echoed similar sentiments on vaccine mandates — of "playing Russian roulette with the lives of children."

"Let's start with the kids. Any time you go to a school, who knows what's in there? They sneeze, everybody gets sick. You think you're dying. You're not. You just got hit by kid stuff," Goldberg said. "We know that this happens. There are reasons that people put these mandates in place."

Goldberg pressed further, saying, "Now, you want to get rid of all of them, you're basically saying, 'Let's see what happens if your kid goes to school with other kids and your grandparents, who are elderly, are in with your grandkids.' You're saying y'all don't care. So, what do we do?"

Even President Donald Trump weighed in on the controversial move, describing the decision to end school-mandated vaccines as a "very tough position" to take.

"I think we have to be very careful. You have some vaccines that are so amazing," he told reporters in the Oval Office, as reported by The Hill. "You have some vaccines that are so incredible. I think you have to be very careful when you say some people don't have to be vaccinated. It's a very tough position."

"Look, you have vaccines that work. They just pure and simple work. They're not controversial at all, and I think those vaccines should be used, otherwise some people are going to catch it, and they endanger other people," he continued. "And when you don't have controversy at all, I think people should take it."