Real Time with Bill Maher - Ep. #731: Neil deGrasse Tyson, Kevin McCarthy, Katy Tur

Episode Date: May 30, 2026

Bill’s guests are Neil deGrasse Tyson, Kevin McCarthy, Katy Tur (Originally aired 5/29/26) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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free of charge. BetMGEMGEMP operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. Welcome to an HBO podcast. from the HBO late-night series, Real Time with Bill Ma. Have to start, there's so much news to get to. I'm not even going to tell you what happened with the Iran situation this week because you'll think it's a rerun and turn the show off. Really? I'm telling you.

This is not a rerun. I mean, unless they're showing it in a couple of months, then I guess it is a rumor. But it's May 29th today. That's where the day is. But every week, it's the same day. We're so close. We're so close.

We're like that store that's. been going out of business for 10 years, you know, just every week, out of business. And the rhetoric, it's just getting uncomfortably sexual for me. We're so close. They're begging for it. They want it so bad.

We're almost there. Jesus Christ. I need a cold shower after I watch Jake Tapper now. It's just ridiculous. Trump says, Iran is negotiating on fumes. Yes, and we're driving them. And, uh,

Good news. Little light at the end of the tunnel. For the first time in 88 days, Iran got their internet back. They had been living without any internet, and everybody in the country got it and said the same thing. Spencer Pratt is going to be the mayor of Los Angeles? They didn't know.

But I tell you, due to the war and the gas prices, unlike nine other things, Trump's approval rating, lowest ever, 34%, even underwater with white people who did not go to college. That was always his base. That's like Taco Bell losing stoners.

I mean, that's... I mean, really. Losing the non-college-educated white people's yet to do. Stage UFC fights on the lawn? Oh, we're doing that. I forgot. We actually are doing that. That's right. My bad. I forgot. But, oh, no, not just that.

A lot of exciting things. We're having a big 250th birthday party for America concert. They announced the lineup. Vanilla ice. I'm not making that. Vanilla ice, Millie Vanilli. Morris Day, Brett Michaels. I think this is very admirable about the president. It shows he's concerned for the unemployed.

After they announced this All-Star lineup, a lot of them said, no, what are you talking about? We're not playing. That's got to hurt a lot when you can't close the deal with. Millie Vanilli. And I guess we should have seen this coming, given the pattern of this administration, the Justice Department is opening criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the woman who sued Trump successfully, about sexual harassment and defamation, and Trump is mom on it. He says he cannot comment on an ongoing retribution.

Okay, but this is such a pattern. If you cross Donald Trump, oh my gosh, they will come after you with anything. It doesn't, they will find anything. They're going after E. Jean Carroll for alleged perjury and also bringing more than four items into the changing room. I mean, and, oh, here's something in the category of, wow, we never used to be this country. Trump is, they're putting out a $250 bill with Trump's face on it.

I guess it's commemorative, but I think maybe you can also spend, I don't know, Republicans in Congress are thrilled about it. They cannot wait to carry it in their wallet. What a switcheroo, having Trump's face next to their ass. Gentle good gentleman. Gentle good gentleman, that's all right. And look, sorry I have to report this. This is horrible news, but I have to report.

People get their news from this show. Ebola is in Africa, and it's apparently not completely under control. Started in a gold mining town. Trump is very concerned. he asked today, is the gold okay? No, but this is especially concerning because the heads of our health departments are Bobby Kennedy and Dr. Oz.

And there was a video of them this week. They were hanging out at Dr. Oz's house and Bobby Kennedy is wrangling snakes. I don't know if they're pet snakes or they just found them in the garage, but there's Bobby Kennedy wrangling snakes. And I have two questions. One, is it right for the Secretary of Health

and Human Services? be engaging in such risky behavior. And has Bobby ever come across an animal and just left it the fuck alone? All right, we got a great show. We have former Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy. Wow. And Katie Turer here.

But first up, he is an astrophysicist and director of the Hayden Planetarium whose new book is called, Take Me to Your Leader, Perspectives on your first alien encounter. Neil deGrasse Tyson, there he is. I must lead off by congratulating you on the Mark Twainstance. Oh, thank you very much.

I feel this. I appreciate it. It goes to people who simultaneously piss you off, inform you, and make you laugh. And you do this uniquely. Well, I think, I pissed them off because I'm right.

But anyway, here's this thing. But I got it to get right back at you because, you know, I've read all your books, and this one, I feel like you hit your stride. I think they're all good, but this one, I think, is your best, and I think you don't get the shine you deserve as a writer because you became a TV star. You did. And people forget, that only happens because the books come first, because the real work is there.

I feel like this is your best one. First of all, it's the most personal. To me, it was. I mean, the fact that you, for example, say when you were a kid, you wanted to be abducted by Alien. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You really...

Not to leave Earth. I mean, I like Earth, but... The Bronx. The Bronx. It was the Bronx, New York, but it was... I just thought the immensity of the universe called to me, and the only way I can get there, given the state of any science or technology on Earth,

I would need help from aliens. So I wanted a beam of light to come down from the sky and take me away. Yeah. So you're disappointed that didn't happen? Yeah, kind of, a little bit. A little bit. Yeah.

Even after reading what they do to people... No. I'm just... Oh! All right, I'm just... Maybe it was before I read about the body orifice. Okay. Curiosity.

But you got to admit it'd be curious. It's odd that aliens would cross the galaxy to go look in your butthole. That would just be... That's... No, it's not. It's not. That's where you would look. Not, wait, up through there.

That's medically, that's what we do anyway. Yeah. We look at... there before and it's yes okay so dogs do it dogs go up their butthole no they just sniff there

we have instruments they have instruments it's not about the butthole it's about getting inside the body through the butthole what would be interesting is if the aliens had some of these dog elements to them and you greet them and the first thing they want to do is go around and sniff your butt let's talk no no I'm serious

we they might have habits that would be strange to us Okay. Don't blow a gasket. I have so many... I knew we were waylaid with this. Okay, go. Because the book is so timely.

We are on this precipice. I've done editorials about this. I've loved that editorial you did. Thank you. I appreciate it. Because we've talked about it before. It was on every point. Right.

And you actually say there's a near certainty that there is alien life in the galaxy. I know you're more skeptical about what we're seeing now, some of the things we've talked about that. You're more skeptical about the fact that, I mean, it has changed. The very serious people are saying these things. The narrative have shifted significantly from the farmers back 40 saying they saw it floating over his crops, to revelers coming out of the bar at 2 a.m.

So that was decades ago. And now we have high-ranking people who, speaking sincerely, under oath, saying they've got aliens in the back shed or reverse-engineered technologies, crash saucers, alien body parts. So what it says to me is, okay, is it now too much to ask to say, bring out the alien? Am I...

But to who? Who's the... I mean, they make the point in the documentary, the disclosure documentary we covered, they make the point that... Age of disclosure, yeah. Age of disclosure. It's sometimes not even the president

who seems to have the authority. It seems to be disparate throughout the government. Even the president himself does it. And I don't know what that means, but I'm not sure that that's not very possible with the way our government... If there was a cover-up, of course the president would be in on it. That's not news to me that that's a possibility. All I'm saying is we have enough information to the point where if they did bring out the alien, it would be almost anticlimactic.

Given what's been described about it and given how we've been treated to every possible imagined alien that you've. can come up with in a century of storytelling on that subject. So, you know what would surprise me? If they did bring out the alien and it was humanoid, because that's weird, most life on earth does not look human with whom we have DNA in common. We have 20, 25% identical genes with a banana. So an alien from another galaxy that has no genes at all should look at least as different from us as we and bananas look from each other.

the same so be creative and if it actually looked humanoid I would be shocked but fine I'll accept it but I'm waiting for that to happen and it's be anticlimactic because I've already

told you it's there it is amazing the lack of imagination that we have when we make movies and the aliens are always just some variation they look like us but they got weird ears or they got ridges here or four fingers instead of five something like that

it just did you see Project Hail Mary? Yes, I did. So that was Andy Ware, the author, also wrote The Martian, and actually he handed me one of my highest compliments ever. He's a software engineer turned novelist. He was writing The Martian.

There's a lot of science in that. When he was going to play Lucy Goosey with the physics, he imagined I was looking over his shoulder. And he didn't want me tweeting about it later. So he doubled down on the science. Really? Well, on the Martian. With Project Hail

Mary, which is kind of like an alien buddy movie a little bit? Yes, with a rock. With a rock, okay, rocky. So, it was his name. So what I liked about it was he tried to break open the Hollywood trope of the humanoid alien. This was crabboid, and it was made of rocks, and it lived in a

different air pressure and air compass, ammonia atmosphere. So he's just trying to break the mold. You shouldn't fault him for doing that. No, but it still seems like whenever they go to another planet in a distant part of the universe, it still looks like San Bernardino. I mean, that was the end.

All right. But I read in your book that every broadcast that we've ever made has gone into space, like anything that was put out in the airwaves. Some airwaves will go out better than others. Like FM goes straight out. AM, remember in the old days?

You could hear AM radio stations from neighboring cities, but FM you couldn't. On a clear night. On a clear night. You could hear Atlanta from... Yes. So these are waves bouncing off one of the layers of the atmosphere. So not all waves would get out, but television would, FM would, and other sorts of radio broadcast. So everything that's been on TV, you know, a speech by Hitler...

Yes. ...has out there. Yes. The sun coms are out there. This show. The honeymooners. The show's out here. Well, not if you would be cable most of your life. No, I did a show on Politically Incorrect.

was on ABC. It wasn't, that's correct. Right. All your cable work is, your cable work is hidden from the aliens. But they might like my, but they might like my earlier work.

So it's a radio bubble. You think they like, me, Doc? So there's a radio bubble. I hear they're a little woke. No, they will, they don't know what to like or dislike. They will use you,

the early signals that are available to them, as an emissary of what it is to be human on earth. Okay, now, what preceded you was, like, the honeymooners and howdy-duty, and, you know, and the honeymooners, remember, we all laughed when Ralph Cramden threatened to punch his wife to the moon. Right. And that was considered funny. If the aliens first get a hold of that, I don't know what they'll think of us.

I know. I mean, if they're that smart, they'll see that, and then they'll see everybody loves Raymond, and they'll go, okay, they grew up. They advanced. Okay, I would like to think that. But if they did visit and really looked around the world,

what forms most of your content in your monologue would be evidence to the alien that there's no sign of intelligent life on Earth. Okay. Well, you know that. And is that why you're not here? Because they immediately went back home. That's one of the points I made in that editorial I did

was that we used to panic about them coming here. And now I welcome it. Because one of the reports said that they may have stopped, you know, they have dis... What? You're making that face ever. No, no, I'm listening. I'm either. They said it hovered over this Air Force base

and it absolutely made the nuclear missiles unable to fight. If they're doing that, I say, bring it on. Yeah, and in fact, that's the subtext of the original and the subsequent films Day the Earth's Still. The aliens found out that we had developed nuclear powers in 1951, and they said this destabilizes the solar system and all other life forms, they came here to stop it. Right. So this has been a subtext for quite some time.

Right, you don't want the Keanu Reeves, sorry, but... Oh, yeah. That was a different one, because we were a source of biodiversity, and we were destroying the... They couldn't use the nuke angle, because they... times had changed. All right. Last question, AI. I got to ask you, what is the connection, broad question, but AI and aliens? I mean, is there any connection?

So are they, you think they're more present possibly here because we got on to AI and this worries them, or it encourages them, or is there a connection? Yeah, in the book, I make a very simple point that if AI is the exemplar of human intellect and the alien is much smarter than us, that's a pretty low bar for them to be It impresses us that computers can be the sum of all of our intelligence. But if we are, if chimps are to us, what we are to aliens, consider it. We have 98% identical DNA with chimps. So there's a lot going on in that 2%.

So imagine an alien species that's 2% beyond us in that same vector. What would we look like to them? them. We'd be babbling chimps in their presence. And so if we say, oh, we got this AI and it's brilliant, they'll just laugh us off the street. And...

It'd be like the chimps building an apparatus to reach the bananas instead of them having to stack boxes to do so. And they'd be really proud of it. And that'd be their Einstein chimp. And then we just look at that and laugh, because our toddlers can do that. That's what we would look like. So, The idea that let's look for other intelligent life in the universe

comes with a really big assumption that we're intelligent. And who said we're intelligent? We did, okay? Well, not some exterior measure of our life form versus other. Well, I don't know. Everything I've learned about science after sixth grade, I know from you. So I'm just going to take that as gospel. All right, I've got to get to the panel.

It's always good to see you, Mike. Thank you. Thank you so much. It's a great thought. Everybody should read it. All right, let's meet our panel. Kevin's back. All right, he's a former Republican congressman

who represented in California's 20th district and served as the 50th Speaker of the House, and he came back to this show. Kevin McCarthy, Unbelievable. And she's the actor of MS now, as Katie TIR reports, and best-selling author of Unbelievable, her new show The Moment with Katie TIR

launches Monday, June 15th, Katie Turr. Great to see you. Thanks for having me. Okay. All right. I want to start with Texas tonight because it's a little political news for people who don't, junkies who follow this. There was a primary down there. And I think it tells us a lot because, you know, a lot of what I read and it's here, it's just bullshit. It's just people's opinions and this and that. Elections are real. Those, that is the one thing that's real. It tells us what people are thinking and what matters to them.

Okay, so they're an election in a Republican primary. John Cornyn, he was the old school, there he is, yes, the Crocker's German, like, you know, this, like, very, what was he, a judge or something before this? Attorney General. Attorney General and four terms, and he's a Republican classic. He lost by almost 30 points to the nut. I'm sorry, but he is. Ken Paxton. The current Attorney General.

The current Attorney General. And this guy is right of Attila the Hun. I mean, I'll just, if you watch MS now all the time, turn the sound down for 30 seconds, because I'm going to tell you. what he believes it and it'll blow your fucking mind. Near total abortion ban. 80% of Americans are against that. He sued five cities that decriminalize marijuana. I take that personally.

Gay marriage said county clerks had religious objections. They could opt out of issuing them. 69% of Americans are for gay marriage. Okay. And he still won. Also an election denier. Still won. By almost 30 points. Now he's going to face the Democrat.

They've been saying forever a Democrat could win. Is this the time it could happen? I mean, if you're going to talk about a perfect storm, isn't this the moment? Yes. I would put my own money that the Democrats. Paxton is a uniquely vulnerable candidate, as you laid out. He's extremely far to the right. That's not so out of step with Texas.

But at the same time, he's been accused of fraud and corruption over and over again. by his own party in Texas. He's not the ideal candidate for them. You know this. John Cornyn was the ideal safe candidate. The Cook Political Report, the second that Paxton won, went from likely to lean Republican.

That's a decent swing. The internal conversation, and you tell me if I'm wrong about this, because you probably know better than I do, $250 million to protect Paxton, in that race, $250 million that can't be spent on Georgia or North Carolina or Alaska. So maybe not Texas? Well, you're saying the Republicans have to spend that to defend Texas? To defend Pakistan against James Tolarico. They don't need to spend that money normally. They can put that money elsewhere.

I mean, as Trump better than anybody knows, money doesn't really win the elections. No. Hillary outspent them by a fortune in 20 seconds. But in some places it will. But if you're going to play money, look, I like, I thought Cornynett did a tremendous job, came close to be something like. But there comes a point when maybe you served too long. He spent $100 million and still lost. Now, remember what this is.

This is a runoff from a primary, so there's fewer voters going in. But he overwhelmingly lost. He lost because Trump. Trump endorsed. He voted with Trump 97% of the time, or as Trump calls it, not good enough. And Trump wanted the other guy.

But what you do? So again, this one's more. thing and then I'll shut up. But like, again, to my point about elections tell us things. What is this tell us? The Trump said, I throw my thunderbolt at John Cornyn and the people obey. Yeah. So you're reading into Paxton, what it really means is President Trump is probably stronger than any president in our lifetime. Stronger than Ronald Reagan in a Republican Party. There's another election that took place there that Trump, it was a Chip Roy, who was a congressman, who was running for Attorney General. Trump did not endorse. Simply by not endorsing, he lost.

Ted Cruz was 100% behind him, out there campaigning. The president can determine who's going to win in a Republican primary. Yeah, but is that going to win a general election? I will bet the Republicans win Texas. Really? It would be closer than it should be. Well, let's talk about who. But this is a problem.

You have to read into it. If Republicans are spending money in Texas, that means it's less money for Ohio, Iowa. Alaska. So that's it. And money's not equal in politics. This Democrat is raising a lot. The more money the candidate raises, the stronger you are because you get TV time at a lower rate.

Paxton doesn't raise great money, so the party has come in. But if you currently add up all the money from all the parties, Republican versus Democrat, Republicans have 800 to the Democrats 200. Republicans may have a negative feeling. Democrats are 10 points lower. Democrats are in the whole money-wise. They put out a report that they denounce. about why they lost the races.

Their leaders are very unpopular. This should be a year where the Democrats have this unbelievable year, and they're not going to have that. They can win the House, but not by the bigger. But for the redistricting that's been happening. If you asked me this question a month ago, I'd say Democrats are going to win the House.

Now what's going to happen, though, Republicans just added nine more points. Now, I don't like this redistricting idea. My first bill in the state legislature was to put it with a commission. I like competition. When I became leader in the Republicans, Pelosi became Speaker. What are you looking at me for it?

Stop them, Bill, stop them. No, this is what I want you to understand. Four years later, we won the majority by five seats. I picked up five more seats in California and didn't have to redraw the lines. So it makes you have better candidates, better message. You should have competition. It's the way the founders designed America. Why are you calling President Trump and telling him that?

I fought it the whole time. But for the same point, for the same point, why didn't we call New Mexico when they did it? Why didn't we do Illinois when they did it? Why didn't we do in New York when they did it? This has been going on by both parties for a long time, but I've called it up.

And now they took it to another level. Yeah, and it's going to harm the country because there's less than 20 seats. Okay, can I get back to Texas for a second? Because we didn't talk about who he's running against, Paxton. Okay, so you have Adelaahan on this side. Then we have this guy, James Tala Rica.

We had him on the show recently. I mean, he seemed like a nice guy. He seems very reasonable. They're spreading rumors that he's gay, or even worse, vegan. In Texas, he did his worst. No, I'm telling you. He said he ran a vegan campaign. He said, right?

He's on video running a vegan campaign. That doesn't play well in Texas. No, he said some things that don't play well in Texas. like God is non-binary, which if there isn't God... He's taken that back. He said it was a silly thing for him to say. It is a silly thing to say, because it just looks bad on a poster or an ad.

Okay, but listen to this. So Stephen Miller of the Trump administration, right there with Attila, he said the Democrats made history by nominating their first transgender Senate candidate that he's just pulling out of his ass. Even if they did, it should not be disqualifying. I mean, Jewish for the Democrats, yes, but not transgender.

Then the Democratic Twitter account fired back, Shut up, you ugly fuck. This is the official Democratic Twitter account. And then Stephen Miller's wife fired back at the woman who ran the Twitter account and said, she's 30, unmarried, no kids. First of all, I love it, that that's the worst insult they can think of. Everybody I know who's unmarried with no kids.

You know, that's good. It's so ugly, and our part of, Politics, I mean, listen, politics has always been dirty to a degree, but it is so much uglier now than it ever was. And there is one person that opened the door to that. The question is, how do we get it back? And especially right now, I don't think Americans, there might have been a time where people were amused by that,

but they're paying $4.50 for a gallon of gas in most places, much more here in Los Angeles, as everyone in the crowd knows, much more here, $6.99. But how do we get out of that? I think you have to look for somebody that's going to help you rise above it. I mean, the Hungarian election that happened just the other day,

ousting Victor Orban. This guy came in, he went county to county, sometimes multiple times, and he told them that the leader is corrupt, they are stealing from you, they're taking money from you, they're making your life worse. I'm going to bring this country back together.

And he had a more inspiring message, not getting down into the mud the way that a lot of Democrats have been doing with Donald Trump. I think it's going to take somebody who comes in and finds a way to bring us all together. What about Matthew McConaughey? Wow. He makes good movies. You knew you said that out loud. I know. I've been thinking it.

I thought that maybe that was just your inner voice. Hey, Matthew McConae, he would be. All right. I have to move on. I had Spencer Pratt on my podcast the other day. I think it drops. You know what? I know I'm supposed to hate him.

I don't. He runs great ads. Yeah, I mean, he's a nice guy. What's charming about him is he has no advisors. I mean, I confronted him on like, you know, this and this. You're going to have to think about it. No, I only care about the issues I care about. So he's very honest about that.

It's funny because he's running as a Republican and doing quite well. Everybody out here is like, what do you think has Ben's a Pratt? He's on everybody's mind. I was asking him about that. He's very uncalifornian in that way for a guy who's from. California. But then I found out he's actually very Californian because he sells crystals. He sells, I'm not kidding, he sells healing crystals, which, yeah, I mean things like this, which, look, people have gifted me with these. I should try, I'm a little under the weather this

week, maybe I go home and sit on it, I don't know how you, but maybe they work like, this is real, like clear courts, they say it's always a little vague, good for amplifying energy and focusing intentions. Amethyst promotes tranquility. Citrine invites wealth. Well, those aren't all of them. Would you like to hear the... Oh, I thought you would. There's so many crystals. There really are. And here's what someone in them will do. You might want to get in on this. Like, Himalayan salt naturalizes the dark energy in your home after your in-laws watch Tucker Carl's... That could be very valuable. Sapphire clears

Mirrish mystical pathways that allow you to recognize when your girlfriend gets a haircut Oh, pink calcide, that's good, brings alignment with forces that silence your Uber driver. Oh, Opel, very good, helps you stay grounded when your chatbot starts blowing smoke up your ass. Tiger's Eye absorbs negative thoughts

to make shower sex seem slightly less awkward and disappointing. Bismuth removes resonant blockages so you can read the redacted names in the Epstein file. Lithium light courts harmonizes all of the natural world to make your dog shit quickly when it's raining. And Micah harnesses spiritual energy in a way that keeps your Gwyneth-Paltrow

vagina candle from starting a wildfire. All right. Because we could. So not to be picking on Donald Trump. all the time, but, you know, what can I say? Even after 10 years, I must say, he does things that you'd think after all this time we would see coming, you know, things that nobody ever did, but he still thinks of them, that a president could do, that nobody did as president, but, and one of them now is

suing the country that he is leading. This was the big story this week, if you don't know about it. Now, there was a crime here. I mean, somebody leaked his tax, not just his, by the way. They leaked a lot of rich people's tax. And this guy's going to jail for five years. Yeah, okay. Now I'm supposed to do that.

But a president suing his own government, so he's the, and then he settled. He settled with himself. A lot of easier than settling with Iran, apparently. But he's both, would we say, the suey and the sewer. No, we're living in the sewer. I don't know. But this, okay, so anyway, he settled, and now the money is going, instead of what the lawsuit was, it was for $10 billion, he said, nope, we'll have to do that. But the money is going to what they're calling an anti-weaponization fund.

A judge has already stopped it, but probably the Supreme Court will let it go through, which will go to the people he thinks have been victims of lawfare, would we call it? So that means the January 6 people. means the January 6th people, now not only did they get a pardon, now they're getting paid, they're getting paid for attacking the Capitol. Is this the right incentivization, Kevin McCarthy? Well, okay, I believe this. You can condemn the violence on January 6th and still believe some of these defendants

had excess persecution and political treatment. Because I do. I do both of those. They don't automatically get any. money. Give me one example. Of people who were put in solitary confinement, not allowed to get out. Look, there are people on January 6th that I condemn that violence.

But there were some people that were caught up just walking through. But let me give you some you up. How do you go back in your government? Were you still in Congress? Yeah, I was escorted out. Okay, let me ask you this. What if your government, say you are in power, you control the presidency, you control the Senate, the other party has the house,

you have an individual that wants to go after these people. So they go after the speaker's cell phone, but they don't tell the carrier who the person is. They don't even tell the judge who the number is because when they get asked, they say, we're afraid of the person leaving the country, even though they have 24-hour surveillance. You know what that person was? Me. So on my own government, when after my cell phone records, when I became speaker of the house, when I was the highest-ranking Republican, never asked me for him. I'd hand them to you, but I think we had separation of powers.

What recourse does anybody have? I'm not going to sue, but how do you make sure that doesn't happen to somebody else? If they would go after the Speaker of the House, the second in line to the president, they can go after anybody. And if they can lie to the judge and say, I can't tell you who the number is, because I'm afraid this person is going to leave the country? I think we're stretching now. Was this in regards to investigating January 6th? But they didn't get the information in your conversations. It was just the calls that were made between you and the White House that they were looking to do.

He went for the whole month. They never told me. They never asked for it. But they didn't get the content of the call, did they? But why do they have the right to my number as is? But weren't they investigating Donald Trump, and they were just trying to find out what he did on that day in the sequence of events? And he just happened to only call Republicans?

Why do they ask for the whole month? And why do they wait to the... The highest-ranking Republican, the Speaker of the House, the second in line to the presidency, and you think, not even asking them for it, but you lie to a judge whose number it is. You lie to the carrier, who it is. And then when you asked about it, well, we had to... we had to lie to you because we were afraid they would leave the country. That's a concern with all the power that prosecutor has.

So if the administration wanted to say, okay, we don't think that was fair and this is what we're going to look into. Or did they hide it? How do they ever find it out? I'm talking about this administration. Then why are they not saying, we want to create this fund, but the January 6 rioters, the ones who beat up cops, are not allowed to apply for this? Why not put a structure around, guardrails around it?

I think you have three questions here, okay? And why pardoned all of them, blanketly? Well, okay. The president has a pardoned all of them. I don't, that's a difference of opinion. Do you agree with it? No, I have a difference of opinion that will have happened on January 6th.

But the first thing that has to happen is who is allowed to get recourse from this? Who makes that decision? Who, what type of money does come from? And does Congress authorize it? I think that's the criteria. I think you're bringing it to a different place. What is making this so insane for, a lot of people is that the January 6th writers are clearly who this is intended for because the

administration keeps saying, of course they're allowed to apply, we're going to consider each case, they're not saying people like Patrick, or I'm sorry, David Dempsey, who stomped on an officer's head, went on an hour-long rampage, beating up officers, using metal poles, pepper spray, broken furniture to go after cops, sentenced to 20 years in prison. Donald Trump pardoned him, and now we're going to pay him? Nothing says. But nothing says you're extraven. Nothing says we're going to pay it. Nothing says we're going to pay it.

But they just... Why is the administration not saying, of course we're not going to pay this guy? Of course we're not going to pay Andrew Paul Johnson. Because they're not making prejudging. They're saying... Who was molesting children and telling them. The president does not get to decide who is.

The president gets to dismiss any one of these panelists if he so chooses. So how does he not get to be the ultimate decision? The settlement is created how you get a $10 billion. lawsuit settling here. I think the Senate is correct in asking the criteria. It doesn't make sense that they would not put any guardrails around it. They wouldn't say an independent panel. They wouldn't say a judgment.

It doesn't make sense that Biden didn't just go after my cell phone numbers. Went after a number of Republican senators, too. Didn't go after any Democrat. And then didn't ask them. Didn't ask them and didn't tell us. We had to find out after we took the majority. But let me ask a political question. Yes. Because I'm starting to get bored.

Does this kind of thing hurt him? I mean, his approval rating is the lowest ever. I feel like that's because the people, even his people, since there's just so much self-dealing. So much stuff like, I mean, stock trades, money managers for the president made more than 3,700 trades in the first quarter, including, for example, Navidia on January 6th, coincidentally. A week later, they cleared NVIDIA to sell chips to China,

which we always said was something we really shouldn't do. China, not exactly our best friends. I mean, stuff like that. Look, I never traded one stock, individual stock when I was a member. I'm not talking about you. I know, but I don't think, but I watched Nancy Pelosi do quite well. I don't think any member should trade stock, and I don't think they should be able to. Okay, I agree.

I'm just saying something like this, you know, I mean, I know Martha Stewart. It's pissed. The thing that hurts most is the price of gas is going to determine a lot what's going to happen in this election. Where is the price of gas going to be? Where's the economy at? And people are going to have questions. But that's rightfully so, why the Republicans in the Senate are asking the questions they're asking. I think 49% of the population uses the word corrupt around Donald Trump.

They see it. They're not comfortable with it. Yeah, I think they do. I think they see that there's always a side deal. There's always something for the family. It looks like he has this idea in his head, like, I'm doing this job. I could be just relaxing in Mar-a-Lago, but I'm doing this job. I've got to wet my beak a little.

It's not a little. No, it's not a little. He's pouring the whole swamp on his head. Well, in his mind, maybe it's a little. How does the Republican Party run against that? They're not doing well right now in the polls. I know Democrats aren't doing well either, but the Democrats will have the opportunity to say, Donald Trump is self-dealing, look at these stock trades.

they'll have the opportunity to say that had a files. I want to see Nancy Pelosi make that argument. I would love to see her. Nancy Pelosi is not the leader. Yes, she is. She still tells Congress. He's not the leader.

She still tells Congress. Really? Yeah. So the Republicans are going to continue to run against Nancy Pelosi. That's a strategy. No. I look forward to Nancy retired.

I don't know. We're in the majority, though. All right. I have one final issue. I want to get to the Pope. Whenever me and the Pope agree on something, I feel like there's something with the planets going on. I don't know what it is.

But, I mean, I've been all over this AI thing. I said a few weeks ago, a month, I don't know when it was, but I said, like, of all the issues I've ever covered, this is the one I find literally the most alarming. When the father of AI, Jeffrey Hinton, says it is a 10 to 20% possibility of an extinction event, an extinction event. And the Pope is on my page.

The Pope put out an encyclical, and artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed, he said. Also, I thought really interesting. The commencement addresses are going on at colleges right now around the country. Yes. And people got some rude awakenings who were doing the speaking, because they thought, oh, the kids, kids love new stuff, I'll bring up AI. Boo! The kids are booing AI.

The kids don't lie. They get it that they're going to take all their jobs. Yeah. I mean, listen, you have all these text. CEOs, these AI CEOs coming out and saying 20% of the jobs are going to be gone. This is going to change everything. You're not going to need workers. Well, how do you expect the population to confront that and to accept it? Also, we can end the world. Okay, great. Let's keep going. What is the plan? You're right. Dario Omodi, he's the CEO of Anthropic. Unemployment, he says, could spike to 10 to 20%. That's what it was in the Depression. 20%. Ford, CEO. said AI will leave a lot of white-collar people behind, could replace half of all white-collar workers.

And what is the plant? I don't get it. It's like, oh, well, no one will work anymore, so we'll give them a universal basic income. With what? If they don't work, that money has to come from the government. How are they going to get it to the government if the people aren't paying taxes? I think Kevin will agree with this. I think people want, it's not even just a universal basic income in the way that doesn't make sense.

People want a purpose. They don't want to sit around and do nothing. They want to do something with their lives. They want to feel like they're useful. Well, I don't know about them. A lot of them don't. No, I think they do. I think that's cynical.

Well, there's 7 million young men who are not unemployed. They're not working. But it's unemployed is you want to work and you can't find a job. Seven million people who are just what they call nilf, not in the labor force. Not working. Not looking. So not all of them think this is a bad thing. But do you want it to sit there.

Look, we're living through an industrial revolution that's going to be faster than we watched before. Our policies are not keeping up with it. This is going to be a real challenge. For all the fear you have of AI, there's also positive things that can happen too. So I think what you really need, you need the policymakers to get ahead of this, create a formation that you still allow AI to grow here in America, but are the same protections at the time. But there is going to be disruption.

And you ought to acknowledge it and find the policies ahead of time to get ahead of it. All right. We'll have to leave it there. It's time for New rules, everybody. Newlo's. Now that Spirit Airlines is no longer with us, Allegiant Airlines, Frontier Airlines, and JetBlue must all participate in a new reality competition called America's Next Top Terrible Airline,

where the pilots say, I'm not here to make connections. That's right. America's next top terrible airline. Flight attendants prepare the cabin for sucking. The makers of this $10,000 toilet have to tell us what's happening in this picture. I get that this smart toilet represents callers' commitment to blending artistry with innovation, offering homeowners a contemporary aesthetic that complements diverse styles and elevates everyday spaces. But why outside?

I mean, other than that, you totally have me. I mean, my God, it seamlessly fuses sculptural beauty with effortless functionality, to embody a work of art, made to empower self-expression, and elevate the bathroom experience. Plus, you can shit in it. No rule, before visiting the New Jersey doctor who claims he can increase the girth of your penis by injecting it with filler made from the belly fat of dead people, consider that you might be creating an even bigger problem.

Sure, you... Sure, you... a little more self-confidence, but now your dick is haunted. The OnlyFans models who are upset at Sidney's Sweetie's portrayal of one of them on Euphoria must be honest about why they're upset. It isn't because she's inaccurately portraying the only fan's industry or mocking the women who do it

or setting back the cause of sexual liberation. It's because she's doing the same thing you do with better tits. New World, someone has to tell the woman who's racked up over one million views with this video of a mysterious, creature lurking in her back alley, that's a tree. I thought I smoked a lot of weed.

All right, and finally, new rule, the next time the Democrats need an autopsy, they have to hire an actual coroner because he or she couldn't do worse than the gutless stiffs they have doing it now. You probably heard the party released their autopsy on the November 2024 loss.

Last week. in May of 2026. Because the Democrats are like Don Corleone. They insist on hearing bad news immediately. Oh, nobody remembers the movie, huh? What a shame. You ought to check it out. It's very good. Well, I've spent a good part of my life trying to get straight answers out of politicians.

And I got to... I got to tell you, while they're in office, you kind of have to trick them. This statement from the administration, the president had the constitutional authority to direct the use of military force because he could reasonably determine that such use of force was in the national interest. That's too vague for you? Totally vague. Okay, because that's from Obama. And he's one of the good ones. But you know when politicians get super honest when they're retiring or even better dying?

And especially when they're dying politically. If you're at 4% in the polls, oh, goodbye bullshit. Bullworth. Make you talk? We can't get you to shut up that. I see it here all the time. Politicians who are intrans intransigent partisans or lackey water carriers and then they're out of office and it's

read my book where I say all the things I should have said but didn't during my 500 years in office. Recently, the press has gotten very excited about some Republican senators who've had just about enough of Trump's shenanigans. Yeah, because they're retiring.

Like Senator Tom, tell Ooh, Tom's mad. Tom is mad these days. As we were previously discussing, the January 6th rioters are now going to get paid for participating in the lucrative new field of insurrecting. And Tom Tillis is all over the news now saying this is stupid on stilts. Suddenly, Tom doesn't give a damn what anyone thinks. You can tell by his tie. Same with Senator Bill Cassidy, who lost his primary.

So now he found the courage to say the words, sludge fund. Mitch McConnell, who coincidentally also has nothing to lose. It goes even further and says it's a slush fund to pay people who assault cops, and then it's utterly stupid and morally wrong. And for once, he means in a bad way. And that's progress, I guess. I just wish he'd talk that way when he was alive. These guys are all the same.

They're like this serial killer who's about to get the chair, so he figures, what the hell? I might as well tell the cops about the other 20 girls I buried in the woods. Republican Lee Atwater and Democrat George Wallace were both lifelong racists who somehow found the courage late in life to renounce those beliefs and when I say late in life,

I mean after they got shot and after they received a diagnosis of inoperable brain cancer. Two-term President General Dwight Eisenhower delivered one of the most important messages a president has ever uttered when he said we should beware the military industrial complex. He said it forcibly, he said it clearly,

and he said it three days before he left office. He's the guy who yells, fuck you as the elevator door closes. You know, maybe instead of asking what would Jesus do, people should ask, what would I do if I were in hospice? A frequent guest of this show, who I always called my favorite congressman,

was in hospice recently. Barney Frank died this month, but on the way out, he said, I want to use my unfortunate situation to say something that I think is very important. He said the key to liberal democracy being able to come back is to get rid of the perception that we have allowed to grow that the entire Democratic Party is committed to a series of very drastic social reconstructions that go beyond the politically acceptable.

And there, in one sentence, is the autopsy the Democrats have been so desperately searching for. from a guy who delivered it right before he needed one himself. It sounds a lot like what Obama said after he left office. The average American doesn't think we have to completely tear down the system and remake it. They just don't want to see crazy stuff. Is this really so hard a message for Democrats to say? There's a Democrat who's running for governor here in California now who's saying it, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan.

Yeah, because he's at 4% in the polls. Everybody has been calling me lately saying, you've got to have this guy on. He's this sensible Democrat we've been looking for. To which I tell them, one, this is a national show. It's not all about you and your life in California. Two, how did you get this number?

And three, what's his plan to get the leaf blowers to shut the fuck up in the morning? But also, you're right. He does sound sensible. Because he's at 4%. That's when everybody's brave. If he got to 40%, Would he still be saying, as he does say,

we need Democratic leaders in California who are willing to say no to their friends? Hmm. That would be the unions, the bureaucrats, the lawyers, the consultants, the regulators, and all the special interest friends who make living in this state such a frustrating, maddening experience.

It's why the railroads don't get built, the potholes don't get filled, the homeless don't get housed, The kids don't learn. Did you know that a black fourth grader in Mississippi is two and a half times as likely to be proficient in math and reading as one in California? Mississippi is kicking our ass in education and for way less money. We're 37th in fourth grade reading, their ninth. Texas is kicking our ass in green energy.

The average time to get solar panels connected there was three to four months. About a thousand days faster than it took me. Remember when I was trying to get my solar hooked up? It would have been quicker to build a windmill. So Texas has passed California in solar and blows away California when it comes to wind and energy storage. How does a state with no-pro-climate policies produce better climate results than a state

where, here, even though we have so much better stickers on our bumper priuses? Bumper stickers on our pre-a-cees. You know what I'm saying. I'll tell you why, because you're allowed to build there. Because every third person in Texas isn't someone whose job it is to make sure nothing gets done. Democrats, these are your issues. Education, race, the environment.

And I say this with love. You're losing to the Waffle House car on the lawn states. All right, that's our show. I want to thank my guest, former speaker Kevin McCarthy, Katie Turr, and Neil deGrasse Tyson. Club Random drops every Monday on YouTube or listen to River you get your podcast. Now go watch overtime on YouTube. And I thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you very much. Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10. Or watch them anytime on HBO On Demand. For more information, log on to HBO.com.