Bill Maher Recounts Surprising Meeting With ‘Gracious and Measured’ Donald Trump

During his monologue in Friday’s episode of Real Time, Bill Maher gave viewers what he knew they’d been waiting for: his “book report” on his recent visit to the White House. Maher, who has been critical of the president before, said he had a sit-down with Donald Trump and was surprised to find him “gracious and measured.”

“As you know, 12 days ago, I had dinner with President Trump, a dinner that was set up by my friend Kid Rock, because we share a belief that there’s got to be something better than hurling insults from 3,000 miles away,” Maher said in the April 11 episode.

The comedian said Trump, who has hurled countless insults at him over the years, was friendly and willing to listen in person. “Just for starters, he laughs!” he said. “I’ve never seen him laugh in public. But he does, including at himself. And it’s not fake. Believe me, as a comedian of 40 years, I know a fake laugh when I hear it. And I thank you for them.”

One illuminating moment came as Trump gave Maher a White House tour. “I don’t remember exactly what we were talking about, but it must have been something with the 2020 election because I know he used the word ‘lost,’ and I distinctly remember saying, ‘Wow, I never thought I’d hear you say that.’ He didn’t get mad. He’s much more self-aware than he lets on in public.”

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Maher said he “never felt [he] had to walk on eggshells around [Trump]” and spoke to him in a way he’d never feel comfortable talking to Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, former presidents for whom Maher says he voted.

“Look, I get it. It doesn’t matter who he is at a private dinner with a comedian; it matters who he is on the world stage,” Maher admitted. “I’m just taking it as a positive that this person exists, because everything I’ve ever not liked about him was, I swear to God, absent, at least on this night with this guy.”

Despite Trump’s willingness to listen, it doesn’t sound like the POTUS conceded many points to Maher. “At one point I said to him, ‘You’re scaring people. Do you really want to be scaring your own citizens so much?’ And I know now you’re all saying, and what did he say to that? Honestly, I don’t remember. But it wasn’t ‘OK, I’ll stop.’”

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But Maher said the “most surreal part of the whole night” was when he got home and saw Trump ranting about “disgusting” and “terrible” political opponents again on TV. “And I’m like, who’s that guy?” Maher said. “What happened to Glinda the Good Witch? And why can’t we get the guy I met to be the public guy?”

He added: “I went into the mine, and that’s what’s down there. A crazy person doesn’t live in the White House. A person who plays a crazy person on TV a lot lives there, which I know is f***ed up. It’s just not as f***ed up as I thought it was.”

Maher concluded his monologue by saying that viewers can hate him for his account of the meeting but swore he wasn’t lying. “Trump was gracious and measured, and why he isn’t that in other settings, I don’t know, and I can’t answer, and it’s not my place to answer,” he said. “I’m just telling you what I saw, and I wasn’t high.”

Real Time With Bill Maher, Fridays, 10/9c, HBO