Whoopi Goldberg has a soft spot for the Jersey Shore crew. The View co-host was pleased to welcome back Snooki and co. to this morning’s episode, where the reality stars appeared to promote Jersey Shore Family Vacation.

To introduce the cast, The View played a clip of the Jersey Shore stars’ first appearance on the daytime talk show way back in 2010. Goldberg recalled, “None of you were sure if this was gonna last at all.”

Jersey Shore originally ran on MTV from 2009 to 2012, before the show was rebooted in 2018.

Obviously, the phenomenon certainly lasted, despite the public struggles of some of the MTV icons. Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino, who served time in prison for tax fraud and openly battled addiction issues before getting sober seven years ago, told The View on Monday’s episode that he’s “grateful” to share his life story with others in the hopes of providing a “survival guide.”

He then plugged his new book, making sure to give a shout-out to Goldberg in particular, whom he said is mentioned in the publication.

“Believe it or not, Whoopi’s in that book,” he said, and Goldberg gave him a smile as she replied, “When [the Jersey Shore cast] first came [to The View], they were getting a lot of heat from people. And I was so glad to see them ’cause they were fresh and they were just ready to do stuff and I said to them, ‘Listen. They’re gonna come for you. You just gotta stay strong, no matter what.'”

“I just wanna say, I’m just so proud of y’all. Because you did not let them define you. You all defined yourselves, which is everything,” she added, before thanking the cast.

The View airs weekdays at 11/10c on ABC.