Elisabeth Hasselbeck 'prayed for guidance' after she learned of Rosie O'Donnell's 'crush' on her

Elisabeth Hasselbeck responded Tuesday to Rosie O'Donnell's admission that O'Donnell had a platonic crush on her when the two were co-hosts on "The View" in the mid-2000s.

"I read that," Hasselbeck, 41, said on "Fox & Friends," which she co-hosted from 2013 to 2015 following her departure from "The View. "I would like to be able to say I didn't, but I read that … and I immediately started praying" for guidance on how to react.

Hasselbeck went on to say that, "If you took her words and you replaced 'Rosie' [with] 'Ronald,'" this would be considered "an objectification of women in the workplace. And so that is disturbing and it's wrong. And whether you're a man or whether you're a woman and you're objectifying women in the workplace, it's wrong."

In excerpts made public Monday from the upcoming book "Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of 'The View,' " by Variety's Ramin Setoodeh, Commack native O'Donnell, 57, revealed she had "a little bit of a crush" on Hasselbeck. Specifying "it was in no way sexualized," O'Donnell explained that, "I wanted to support, raise, elevate her, like she was the freshman star shortstop and I was the captain of the team."

Hasselbeck also objected to O'Donnell having said of her, "She was the MVP of a Division 1 softball team for two years that won the finals. There are not many, in my life, girls with such athletic talent on sports teams that are traditionally male that aren't at least a little bit gay."

"I think her casting a stereotype on female athletes in what she said … that all female athletes are a little bit gay" is wrong, Hasselbeck told the "Fox & Friends" hosts. "And I would say this to her — I tried to call her yesterday; her number is old, the one on my phone … That's an unfair stereotype and it seems selfish in a way and I think that it's untrue.' "

O'Donnell has not commented on social media.