Whoopi Goldberg apologizes after repeating Holocaust remarks: 'I'm still learning a lot'
For the second time this year, Whoopi Goldberg is apologizing after making controversial comments about Jewish people and saying the Holocaust wasn't about race.
After coming under fire for recent remarks she made to the British newspaper The Times, the actress and TV personality said Tuesday that she had been trying to explain the comments she made earlier this year that got her suspended from The View for two weeks.
"Recently while doing press in London, I was asked about my comments from earlier this year," Goldberg said in a statement provided to EW. "I tried to convey to the reporter what I had said and why, and attempted to recount that time. It was never my intention to appear as if I was doubling down on hurtful comments, especially after talking with and hearing people like rabbis and old and new friends weighing in. I'm still learning a lot and believe me, I heard everything everyone said to me."
Larry Busacca/Getty Images Whoopi Goldberg
She added, "I believe that the Holocaust was about race, and I am still as sorry now as I was then that I upset, hurt and angered people. My sincere apologies again, especially to everyone who thought this was a fresh rehash of the subject. I promise it was not."
Goldberg initially ignited criticism in January, when she and her cohosts on The View were discussing the banning of Maus — the Pulitzer-winning graphic novel about the Holocaust — by a Tennessee school board. At one point Goldberg said that "the Holocaust isn't about race" but rather "man's inhumanity to man."
Her comments sparked an immediate backlash, drawing responses from the Anti-Defamation League and the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and State Museum. Hours after the broadcast, Goldberg issued a statement on social media in which she apologized for her wording. She was subsequently taken off the air for two weeks.
This past weekend, a wide-ranging interview published by The Times rekindled the controversy. At one point Goldberg said that some Jewish people are split over whether they are a race or a religion, and she went on to repeat the assertion that the Holocaust "wasn't originally" about race.
Among the voices calling out Goldberg in the wake of the interview was Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, who said her comments were "deeply offensive and incredibly ignorant."
Goldberg issued her apology shortly after. Her statement concluded, "In this time of rising antisemitism, I want to be very clear when I say that I always stood with the Jewish people and always will. My support for them has not wavered and never will."
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