Liberal comedian Bill Maher called Democratic leaders of sanctuary cities “hypocrites” for their reaction to the border crisis, during his “Club Random”podcast on Sunday.
Maher raised the immigration issue after guest and former TV anchor Katie Couric argued that class resentment and anti-elitism had led blue-collar workers to support former President Trump. Maher agreed but suggested that resentment was legitimate when it came to how Democratic leaders responded to the immigration crisis overwhelming border towns.
“Take something like the Sanctuary City hypocrisy,” he told Couric. “These elite cities [think] ‘We’re the good people’…until they send the immigrants, actually, to their cities.”
Maher claimed New York City Mayor Eric Adams and other Democratic leaders ended up talking like Republicans when the border crisis hit their own communities.
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“The things that came out of the mouths of the leaders of New York and Chicago and even San Francisco, were pretty astounding. You would think it was Trump talking!” he said.
Couric agreed with Maher and suggested that the media hadn’t given enough attention to the impact of the surge in migrants on border towns.
She shared how her friend in Florida “loved” that Republican Governors Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott had sent migrants to NYC and Martha’s Vineyard because she felt no politicians “cared” about their plight.
“It’s just fair,” Maher said. Republicans like Abbott and DeSantis had held these Democratic leaders to their word, he argued, “They just called their bluff, very much the same way the Democrats called the bluff of the Republicans on the immigration bill.”
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Maher and Couric also debated over whether the media was more biased now than in the past, with Maher remarking that he doesn’t “trust” any media outlet anymore.
CNN and The New York Times used to be “more neutral,” he told Couric, but now report more from an “activist” bent.
However, Couric questioned if there ever was a “truly objective” press.
Both Maher and Couric claimed former President Trump’s falsehoods had put the media in a tough spot, with Couric arguing Trump had pushed the press to be more aggressive with fact-checking.
Maher said he was “bored” with the media’s negative treatment of Trump and wished they would understand the perspective of the typical Trump voter.
“Not to defend Trump, but to defend the people who still vote for him. Because what they see on the other side, to them, is even more dangerous. Because it’s closer to home,” he said, referencing gender ideology in schools and anti-Trump sentiment in the media.
“Those kind of things are what they say, ‘That’s why I’m voting for Trump,'” Maher added. “‘We don’t like him but he’s all that stands between us and madness,’ That’s their view. I would like that view presented [by the media].”
