On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher and Newsweek Opinion Editor Batya Ungar-Sargon that 2024 Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s reported support for a ban on abortions after 16 weeks is what Democrats used to believe and his position on immigration is what Democrats used to have in the ’90s. But Maher later said that Trump has taken every side of all the issues.
Ungar-Sargon said, “To you and to most Democrats, Trump is an extremist. But to Trump’s supporters, he is a liberal and they like that about him.”
Maher agreed with the assessment that he views Trump as an extremist and expressed doubt about the assessment of him as a liberal.
Ungar-Sargon continued, “So, for example, if you look at his position on abortion, 16 weeks. That used to be the Democrats’ position on abortion.”
Maher responded, “I agree.”
Ungar-Sargon continued, “He just got $45,000 from the Teamsters union who gave to the RNC a week after meeting with Trump, his position on immigration, that was the Democrats’ position in the ’90s.”
Maher responded, “Sure.”
Maher added, “You can hate Trump, you can’t hate all the people who like him, it’s half the country, and there’s so much crazy shit on the left that, would I ever vote for Trump? No, but I get it, I can get it. I read this week there [are] like 1,044 school districts now…over a thousand school districts, that’s a lot, who will not tell the parents if the kid transitions.”
Former Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) then stated, “But you can’t apologize for what Trump does. Like, you can say he’s pro-gay, he’s pro-choice, all of these things, but then he nominates Supreme Court nominees that are from the Federalist Society. And he doesn’t try to jam pro-gay rights legislation through the Senate, twist arms, and all of that. He couldn’t do anything, all he did was pass a tax cut and then he nominated the extreme people to the Supreme Court that are now making sure that he doesn’t have a trial. So, you can — he says everything, he’s been on every side of every issue.”
Maher responded, “Exactly. That’s his genius, I remember when he was running in 2016, I think he was on Chris Matthews and the abortion issue came up and he said, well, I think you’re going to have to put the doctors in jail. Remember after one of the gun shootings? He was like, Mike, what don’t take away the guns first? Things that, if anybody else said, it would be anathema on the right.”
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