Discussing his upcoming White House dinner with longtime foe Donald Trump, Bill Maher told NewsNation anchor Chris Cuomo that he has “credibility” with the president and his MAGA base’s “respect” because of his honesty “about the woke train to crazy town.”
Maher also suggested that his sit-down with the president was similar to Richard Nixon’s historic visit to China in 1972, though he acknowledged that he doesn’t think his one-on-one with Trump will do much to “heal” the country.
During his Club Random podcast last week, Maher revealed that he had accepted a meeting with the president, who once sued the Real Time host for $5 million for joking that Trump was the son of an orangutan. Maher also noted that MAGA-loving musician Kid Rock had set up the invitation.
“Kid Rock was here a couple of weeks ago, and he said, ‘I want you to meet Trump,’” he noted. “He said, ‘I’m gonna take you to the White House.’ So now we’re gonna do that.”
He also told comic Andrew Schulz that any criticism he may get from the left from meeting with the president was nothing more than “mean girl” behavior and that he’s “not playing this game.” Meanwhile, during an appearance on Cuomo’s podcast this week, he continued to defend dining with a leader he has long assailed for being a threat to democracy.
The comedian also invoked what has become his favorite topic in recent years — how liberals and Democrats have become too “woke,” which has made him something of a conservative darling on Fox News.
“I’m doing it because first of all, it was presented as… maybe this is a beginning to heal America. Now, I don’t have some sort of complex where I think I can heal America, I can’t,” Maher told Cuomo. “Let’s get that clear. I’m not going to be healing America. But if two guys who’ve been at each other for so long — I mean, it’s kind of a Nixon to China thing. I have the credentials.”
Adding that there was “nobody who was harder on Trump or more prescient about the fact that he wasn’t going to leave office voluntarily than I was,” Maher reiterated that he had the “credentials” to sit down with the president. And much of that reason, he insisted, is because of his criticism of liberals.
“But they also respect me because I’m honest about the woke train to crazy town,” the 69-year-old comic declared. “And I don’t shrink from that. And I’ve also lost a lot of fans for that. The woke people have left the building, and I’m willing to make that sacrifice. But it does give you a certain credibility.”
Calling it an “honor to be invited to the White House,” Maher continued to grumble about the scolding he’s received from some acquaintances about his upcoming visit with Trump.
“I’ve already had a couple of people who I said to them, you know, I’m just gonna take it as a backhanded compliment that you glide right past the idea that little Bill Maher from River Vale, New Jersey, just a humble kid from the suburbs, was invited for a private dinner at the White House,” he said. “You glide right past that to how dare you talk to him and that you’re not impressed by it at all. I’m impressed by it a lot. I’m impressed the f*** out of it.”
Maher concluded: “I get to go to the White House and, yes, the structure of this dinner is just let’s talk. Let’s talk to each other face-to-face. Let’s stop shouting from 3,000 miles away, you know? So if they expect me to be leaving in a MAGA hat, they’re gonna be very disappointed, but I know they don’t… Look, it probably will accomplish very little, but you gotta try, man. You gotta try.”