Sportscaster Sage Steele has accused the late Barbara Walters of elbowing her into a wall backstage at The View after a segment about Barack Obama.
Steele, who was born to a black father and a white mother, once debated Walters on The View over her decision to identify as ‘biracial’ even though the then-US president, who has the same ethnic background, called himself ‘black.’
After the taping, Steele says, Walters confronted her backstage and gave her a shove that sent her hurtling ‘into the wall and the trash can.’
‘This 140-year-old woman just tried to, like, tackle me!’ Steele quipped on The Megyn Kelly Show. She further claimed that Walters’ co-host Whoopi Goldberg ‘pulled me aside’ after the alleged elbowing and said: ‘Don’t you let her do it.’
After Steele’s comments went public, a representative for the Walters estate insisted to Variety: ‘I find this impossible to believe and uncharacteristic of Barbara!’
Wow: Sportscaster Sage Steele (right) has accused the late Barbara Walters (left) of elbowing her into a wall backstage at The View after a segment about Barack Obama
Barbara Walters retired from The View in 2014 and, after years of rumors that she was suffering from dementia, died last December at the age of 93.
On Kelly’s podcast, Steele described her alleged encounter with Walters, saying that ‘it was Barbara, Whoopi and myself, in the dark green room off to the side.’
She added: ‘I was probably about four feet from the wall and the trash can and Barbara was standing over here in front of me.’
Steele continued: ‘And she just started to back up towards me, and looked at me and got close, and elbowed me, and it pushed me back into the wall and the trash can.’
She alleged that ‘some of the producers saw it. Whoopi saw it, and Whoopi was like: “Come here,” and she was great, and she pulled me aside in her little area and she was like: “Don’t you let her do it,” and I’m like: “Am I in a movie right now? One of the legends in this industry just tried to beat me up!”‘
Her bombshell new interview came days after she settled a lawsuit with ESPN, officially parting ways with the network after over a decade and a half ‘so I can exercise my first amendment rights more freely.’
Steele, who used to be a co-host on Sports Center, argued in her suit that she was temporarily suspended and then ‘sidelined’ by ESPN because of remarks she made during a podcast conversation with NFL alum Jay Cutler.
On that podcast, she forcefully criticized the network’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, saying she personally ‘didn’t want to’ get inoculated but ultimately acquiesced.
Throwback: Steele appeared on The View with Barbara Walters more than once, including this appearance on February 5, 2014
Return: Steele returned to the program on April 16, 2014, just one month before Walters announced her retirement from the program
Steele clarified that ‘I respect everyone’s decision’ regarding the jab, but took the view that ‘to mandate it is sick’ and ‘scary to me in many ways.’
She received a torrent of blowback not only for her mandate position, but also for her comments on the same podcast about how female sportscasters dress.
‘So when you dress like that,’ she said: ‘I’m not saying you deserve the gross comments, but you know what you’re doing when you’re putting that outfit on too.’
it was on the same podcast that she discussed her on-air tussle with Barbara Walters about calling herself ‘biracial’ when Barack Obama called himself ‘black.’
Steele said wryly that she found it ‘fascinating’ for Obama to self-identify as black, ‘considering his black dad was nowhere to be found but his white mom and grandma raised him. But hey, you do you. I’m gonna do me.’
Making her claims: ‘This 140-year-old woman just tried to, like, tackle me!’ Steele quipped on a new episode of The Megyn Kelly Show, where she is pictured
Details: Steele says that after the alleged elbowing, she received encouraging words from Whoopi Goldberg, who is pictured on The View in 2012 with Walters and Michelle Obama
Her appearance on Jay Cutler’s podcast provoked a deluge of backlash, and as the criticism mounted and Steele herself tested positive for COVID-19, ESPN decided to take her off the air for over a week.
‘At ESPN, we embrace different points of view – dialogue and discussion makes this place great,’ said the network statement at the time.
‘That said, we expect that those points of view be expressed respectfully, in a manner consistent with our values, and in line with our internal policies.’
She eventually took the network to court, asserting in her lawsuit: ‘ESPN’s inconsistency in how it treated Steele as compared to her peers demonstrates that Steele was punished not only for exercising her constitutional right to free speech but because of the content of that speech.’
It emerged earlier this week that Steele was leaving the network and the lawsuit had been settled, though the precise terms have not been disclosed.
