What Is Elisabeth Hasselbeck Famous For?
Elisabeth Hasselbeck has a new book coming out and she’s making the circuits promoting it, talking about her previous endeavors and skating around the bombshell revelation regarding former co-host Rosie O’Donnell’s crush on her. In Hasselbeck’s new book, she reveals the grace she has gained and the lessons she has learned throughout her life.
As the former talk show host embarks on a new chapter, she is visiting many former friends to promote her book. Let’s take a look at what made this Rhode Island girl famous and what she has to say about it now.
Before there was Meghan McCain, there was Elisabeth Hasselbeck
ABC’s The View is famous for stirring up controversy. The morning roundtable talk show discusses the news in front of a live studio audience every weekday. The topics range from celebrity gossip to current political affairs.
It is usually the political topics that prompt online feuds and heated discussions between the show’s hosts. The high drama can likely be contributed to the unbalanced political views of the hosts.
Today’s panel features Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, Meghan McCain, and Abby Huntsman, with McCain as the lone Republican co-host. During Hasselbeck’s run, the vocal conservative was joined by Behar, Goldberg, Barbara Walter, and Sherri Shepherd. Hasselbeck was often at the center of political feuds as the only conservative on the show.
Hasselbeck joined The View in 2003. But in 2013, the host was told that her contract would not be renewed. Hasselbeck says that she literally could not breathe when she received the news, “I was bent over — shock, asthma and betrayal all stealing my wind.”
According to Hasselbeck, producers reached out to her recently to return to the show as a regular co-host, but she declined. She says God gave her the freedom to let go of that opportunity.
Hasselbeck joined Fox News after ‘The View’
After her unexpected exit from ABC, Hasselbeck needed to find a new home. Hasselbeck found that home on Fox and Friends. The talk show host revealed her former co-host Barbara Walters was instrumental in landing her job at Fox. Walters wrote a letter to former Fox CEO and Chairman Roger Ailes, a gesture that Hasselbeck said “meant the world” to her.
Hasselbeck stayed with Fox and Friends from 2013 to 2015. Recently, she visited her former home to discuss her new book with the hosts and discussed how at the time she decided to leave the show. She explained that she was simply running out of gas. She praised the hosts for their hard work and early hours and just realized that she couldn’t do it anymore.
Hasselbeck was a beloved member of the show and she was welcomed back to promote her book with open arms. Hasselbeck noted that the studio felt like home and she was sad to leave.
She first rose to fame on reality TV
Before Hasselbeck became known for her strong political views and Christian values, Hasselbeck was a young girl from Rhode Island appearing on a relatively new reality show, Survivor. Known as Elisabeth Filarski at the time, the 24-year-old was a shoe designer and recent college graduate.
On Survivor she was known as a cute and spunky player with a lot of heart and drive. Hasselbeck finished 4th in the show’s second season, outlasting all of the other members of the Kucha tribe. She was asked to return for Survivor: All-Stars but declined the invitation.
What about that crush?
Hasselbeck says that she feels she has been objectified by O’Donnell’s remarks that she had a crush on her. She said that if a man were to make the same comments that O’Donnell did, that everyone else would easily view it the same way. She told the cast of The View the feelings were not mutual and that she was offended by the talk show host’s comments. But at the same time she says, she forgives O’Donnell and has reached out to her to try to talk.
