On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher stated that while he agrees with President Joe Biden’s oligarchy warning from his Farewell Address, it is a little odd since the Biden administration pushed tech companies to censor speech.
Maher began by saying he thinks Biden is right and noting all the tech figures who are set to be guests at Trump’s Inauguration before joking that all of them are there, “because we want to stick it to the elitists.”
Republican strategist Erin Perrine remarked that Biden’s rhetoric is odd since Democrats “certainly didn’t mind extreme influence when both the Biden White House and the Biden campaign were pressuring these social media companies to suppress conversations, stories, the Hunter Biden laptop story, people pushing back on COVID that they didn’t like.” And Maher agreed.
Later, Maher said, “I take your point about free speech. I think I’m with you. Zuckerberg, the cynical people are saying — and maybe they’re right — that he did a 180 on free speech.”
After recounting how Zuckerberg said Biden officials pressured them to censor, Maher further stated, “It is possible, I think, that he’s a fairly young guy and he got taken the first time around and he’s like — because I think his basic instinct to begin with was a free speech guy, and now he’s like, yeah, you know what? I should have gone with my gut.”
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