Bill Maher is played by JD Vance in HBO’s ‘Real Time’ and admits he might vote Republican in 2028
On Thursday, Vice President J.D. Vance visited the Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in California and, as is his custom, put his foot straight into his mouth.
The author of ‘Hillbilly Elegy’, who compared President Trump to Hitler Before serving as his running mate, he took it upon himself to defend Nixon’s legacy and downplay his corruption.
“I think his historical legacy is having a bit of a renaissance, but I think that’s fair,” Vance said. said about Nixon. “If Watergate happened tomorrow, it would be a 12-hour news story. Like, the idea that it would have brought down a presidency is insane.”
The context was clear: Watergate would only be a twelve-hour news story these days because it pales in comparison to the rampant corruption of the Trump administration.
Vance sat down with Bill Maher the next evening for an interview on “Real Time” to promote his new book “Communion” about his faith, becoming the first sitting vice president to appear on the HBO show. And the two started their conversation by talking about Vance’s ongoing negotiations with Iran, which appear to be going nowhere.
“You negotiate for America. I support for America… Why is this different? Why isn’t it nonsense this time?” Maher asked.
According to Vance, his negotiations have been successful because the price of oil has “fallen to $73 a barrel” and their “nuclear program has been destroyed,” adding, “If they are willing to change, we are willing to change; If they’re not willing to change, we still essentially hold all the cards and I think this is a good place to be.”
“But their nuclear program has not been destroyed,” Maher replied.
“What part of it has not been destroyed?” Vance asked. “What you have to destroy is their ability to enrich uranium, which has been destroyed.”
“How do we know that?” Maher shot back. “All this time we had to go in and we had to get the dust out. And we didn’t go in there, so how do we get the dust?”
The vice president reiterated that the program was “functionally destroyed,” without citing any evidence to support this.
Maher’s next topic, or attempt to broach one, was to get Vance to admit that the Trump administration’s ICE enforcement went too far.
“ICE, all that shit. Too rough. Too mean. Too unnecessary,” Maher offered. “I’m not asking you to apologize…I’m just saying that it would go a long way to get people to want to [have] just close the door completely on you and your administration if you would only acknowledge that – that you have gone too far. You’ve gone too far, and you should own that like you owned ‘childless cat ladies.’
Vance clarified, saying, “You can’t conduct a law enforcement operation like that without having situations that are captured that way… I don’t think there’s an easy way to do this.”
Maher then confessed to Vance that he could vote for the next Republican candidate over a democratic socialist if the right would at least start admitting election losses instead of calling foul play every time, à la Trump.
“If this is where the Democratic Party is going… this obsession with Israel, with hatred of Jews, with the fact that they don’t believe in capitalism, no prisons, if this is where they’re going, then my vote is in play,” Maher told Vance. “It’s either you or Rubio. Here’s my deal breaker on your side: Under Trump, you have two outcomes an election can have: we win or they cheated. That shit has to stop. And that means the person who has to stop it is you, or Marco. Can you tell me you’re going to do that?”
He couldn’t.
“Okay, Bill, so this is probably where I’m going to lose you,” Vance offered. “I don’t think we should not allow elections, but I don’t think that’s what’s going on… The biggest criticism I had about the 2020 election is that you had tech companies literally censoring negative information about the left and promoting negative information about the right.” (And yet, right-wing Facebook pages reportedly deserved more involvement than the left parties during the 2020 elections.)
Maher fired back: “Well, you get a big pat on the back when you go back to the White House.”
During their interview, Maher seemed outmatched as Vance talked in circles around him. And for someone who rails against the Trump administration every Friday night, he treated the vice president with kid gloves.
