This article, authored byJason Cohenis republished under the Creative Commons “CC BY-NC-ND” license with permission fromThe Daily Caller News Foundation.
Comedian Bill Maher defended his dinner with President Donald Trump as author and podcaster Sam Harris expressed skepticism during a Monday episode of “Club Random.”
Maher attended adinnerat the White House with Trump in March 2025 and subsequentlycommendedthe president’s behavior on “Real Time with Bill Maher.” After Maherassertedon hispodcastthat he couldn’t “find the logical argument for not having dinner with Trump,” Harris said he felt it was “truly a no-win situation” for the host.
“It’s only a no-win with the people who hated me already — the Bluesky crowd who don’t like you either,” Maher retorted, referring to the left-wing social mediaplatform.
Harris pivoted to criticizing Maher’s description of the dinner on “Real Time.”
“There was one thing that was genuinely confusing about your summary of the dinner. I can see why you got the backlash, because there was a very bright shiny object in what you said that you didn’t seem to see,” he said. “You didn’t anticipate it was going to have the effect it had, which is when you said, ‘Listen, I’ve met the man behind closed doors. He’s not crazy. He’s not crazy the way you think. He’s not who you think he is.’”
Maher interrupted to quote precisely what he said on his show.
“‘A crazy person doesn’t live in the White House. A person who plays a crazy person on TV lives in the White House.’ And I’m not the only one to have said that,” Maher said.
“The subtext of what you were saying was, ‘This is less scary,’ but the way it landed with your audience or much of your audience is, ‘I’m not sure that’s not more scary or more evil,’” Harris said.
Maher dismissed the criticism, saying he reported what happened and could not control how his audience interpreted it.
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