On Monday, renowned psychologist and television personality Dr. Phil McGraw took the hosts of “The View” to school in a discussion on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on children. He particularly focused his argument on students’ mental health and the consequences of prolonged school closures.

Dr. Phil traced the onset of a troubling trend back to the late 2000s, pinpointing the arrival of smartphones as a pivotal moment. “Like ’08, ’09, smartphones came on and kids started, they stopped living their lives and started watching people live their lives,” he said.

The shift, according to Dr. Phil, marked the beginning of “the biggest spike and the highest levels of depression, anxiety, loneliness, and suicidality since records have ever been kept.” The conversation took a more critical turn as Dr. Phil scrutinized the decision to shut down schools in response to the pandemic.

“Who takes away the support system for these children? Who takes them away and shuts it down?” he questioned.

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“Are you saying no schoolchildren died of COVID?” Joy Behar asked later on.

“I’m saying it was the safest group. They were the less vulnerable group, and they suffered and will suffer more from the mismanagement of COVID than they will from the exposure to COVID,” Dr. Phil clarified, before delivering a final punch that brought the show’s left-wing audience to cheers.

“And that’s not an opinion. That’s a fact.”