'Punishment is excessive': Sara Haines disagrees with her co-hosts over Donald Trump's New York civil fraud case sentencing on 'The View'

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: The February 20 episode of 'The View' had hosts Sara Haines, Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, and Alyssa Farah Griffin discussing the sentencing of Donald Trump in the New York civil fraud case, in which he was ordered to pay $355 million in fines.

While all the co-hosts were satisfied with the order issued by the State Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron, Haines surprisingly had a different opinion during the show's Hot Topics segment.

Sara Haines' opinion on Donald Trump's sentence in NY civil fraud trial

Sara Haines began by saying that she always supported people, especially the former president, being held accountable and taken to task. However, she felt that "the punishment was excessive" in this case since there were no victims. 

"It's all legal," she clarified, before adding, "All falls within the legal realm, but the number on that... the (case being) victimless. If you take a company ... and it's a cosmetic company and it poisons you and then that company is sued, they will be held accountable for a greater number because they have direct human victims in the crime."

"Even Trump was held on this same one before for only $25 million in the Trump University case, and those were victims. Those were people that were completely conned into a degree," she continued.

"My criticism of this is not because I feel any sorrow for Donald Trump, but I do think that he is an instigator of so distrust in institutions. It's his one thing - everyone is completely against him, it's a political witch hunt, it's personal - this ruling, to the number it has been held, is slightly playing into the optics that this was political and personal," Haines added.

Alyssa Farah Griffin shared her concern about the sentencing

Earlier on the show, Griffin expressed that while she was happy with the outcome, she was the "least concerned" with this case in particular.

"For all intents and purposes, it was a victimless crime... Talking to Republicans ... many of whom are very much over Trump, they worry that it's gonna take the seriousness off of the really serious cases," she stated.

"You've got January 6 ... 80 million voters that he tried to defraud, Capitol police who were beaten that day, Fulton County voters he tried to defraud, ... documents - American national security were harmed, these are the most important cases," Griffin continued.

"What I hate is that ... Trump is going to use this judgment to say, 'Look it's a witch-hunt. They are trying to bankrupt me. Those other cases are also witch-hunts.' And with some of the public, that's going to resonate," she added.