Report: Abby Huntsman refused ABC and The View producers' call for her to refute on-air reports of a "toxic culture"

The Daily Beast

Huntsman, who announced Monday she's leaving the ABC daytime talk show, was asked to contradict stories from CNN Business and Page Six of a "toxic culture" on set, reports The Daily Beast's Lloyd Grove. "Before Tuesday’s live show, according to multiple sources, Senior Executive Producer Hilary Estey McLoughlin and Barbara Fedida—ABC News’ senior vice president for talent, editorial strategy and business affairs—asked Huntsman to go on-camera and counter reports of internal strife by putting a positive spin on The View’s supposedly collegial workplace instead of the scorpions-in-a-bottle ambiance that is frequently portrayed in the tabloids," reports Grove. "But Huntsman, in her second year on The View, instead took the advice of the talk show’s moderator Whoopi Goldberg, whom the 33-year-old mother of three young children considers a mentor; Goldberg, 64, told her not to do it, sources said, because she had already said her warm goodbyes and praised her co-workers on Monday’s episode 'as the smartest women I’ve ever worked with,' adding, 'I love all of you here'—and why fuel tabloid gossip by being defensive?" ALSO: The View is reportedly fearful of more leaks of backstage drama.