Real Time with Bill Maher - Overtime – Episode #696: Scott Jennings, Peter Hamby

Episode Date: May 20, 2025

Bill Maher and his guests answer viewer questions after the show. (Originally aired 5/16/25) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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late-night series, real-time with Bill Maher. Robertson, he hosts Snapchat's good luck America, Peter Hamby, and he's an author in CNN's senior political contributor, Scott Jennings.

Andy. First question is for you, Scott, as someone who's considering a Senate run to replace him, what? You're not? Usually when someone puts out a book, it means they're going to run for office. Not always, but that always is...

Isn't writing a book the fastest way to get rich in America right now? No. You said it was only fans. No, you don't get rich writing books. I need to tell you, bro. Too late. Anyway, what do you believe will be Mitch McConnell's legacy? I guess that's who you'd be replacing, right?

When you run for Senate, if you run for Senate. He's up in 26. Supreme Court, I mean, without question. I mean, had a long career, 42 years, won seven elections, Kentucky, but without question, I think his legacy is the court, specifically the Supreme Court. If he doesn't hold that seat open in the 2016 election, I'm not sure President Trump would have won, and then the cascade of appointments that followed will change the course of this country for a generation.

And people don't remember what you're talking about. In 2015, Scalia died? Was that it? It was, or was it 16? 15. 15. Okay. So Obama still had another over a year in office. And usually when a president is in office, he gets to choose who the Supreme Court nominee, he wanted Merrick Garland. And Mitch McConnell would not even give him a hearing. That was unprecedented. What is the latest bullshit argument why that's okay? If the bullshit you're referring to is the advise and consent clause in the U.S. Constitution, that's the argument. At the time, the argument was it's too close to an election.

It was 2015. Well, that wasn't the full argument. The full argument was we had divided government, and then the American people were going to make a decision, and they did, and they chose a Republican president. Well, as I just said in the editorial, if it had been the other way around, you would have went apeshit about it.

If somebody had tried... No? You would have been full with it? Well, I live... I mean, I live... I live through the Bush years when the Democrats in the Senate did everything they could possibly do to obstruct George W. Bush from putting judges on the court,

So it's not the first time I look through. Not judges. This is Supreme Court. And did Bush get a pick on the Supreme Court? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay. And they gave him a hearing. And then they voted on it.

They could have voted him not that. We've seen that. Nixon suggested two people who they didn't put on the court. You can do that. But you get to actually have a hearing. This was completely unprecedented and unconstitutional and illegal. And by the way, your hero, Mitch McConnell, when they asked him, if he would do it again, he said, sure.

You know? I mean, and then they did do it again in reverse. When Amy Cummy Barrett was put on the court, it was the exact same thing. It was even closer to an election. It was literally like three weeks a month before the election. We didn't have divided government then. We had unified government.

That's what I'm saying. It's situational for you. Right, exactly. It's just, you know. Why are you guys against the exercising of political power? That's, that's, the extent of political power is fine. This is unconstitutional. That's what we're against.

We're against going outside the law. They wrote it down. It's very clear. Same thing as some of the things Trump is saying in now about a third term. It's very clear. It's in the Constitution. Aren't you the guys who carry

the little pocket constitution in your king? Don't you have one under your pocket square there? Yeah, and in it... And it says two terms. It says a president gets to pick who is the guy they're going to put up for the Supreme Court. And it says the Senate has to confirm them.

And it says the Senate gets to advise and consent on this, and that's up to the Senate on how they do that. It's a co-weekful branch of government. Oh, so that is the latest bullshit argument. All right, that was my question. All right, I knew there was one. Okay. What did you make of Donald Trump's post this morning,

alleging that since I said I hate Taylor Swift, this guy. All the deals, but still has time for this. You've got to love it. Since I said, I hate... She's no longer hot. Or I don't think he means physically hot. I think he means hot in the business.

I think he's, well, she just finished the biggest... Are you sure he doesn't mean physically hot? I don't. I do not mean that. I assume he's like... I assume he's criticizing her looks. That was my first reaction. No, I...

Oh, no longer. I don't think he means that. I recall when he went to the Super Bowl earlier this year, he noted at the time that the crowd booed her and cheered him. I think at that point he started to detect that she was faltering with the public And to me, that's a moronian. I will say this actually. Scott has a point here.

I mean, first of all, she made over a billion. She's a billion dollars on that tour. It's the biggest tour ever. Yeah, like, biggest tour ever in history. When she endorsed Kamala Harris right before the election, and it was a very sort of, you know, I think it was like an Instagram post or something. Her approval ratings, like people poll this stuff. Her approval ratings went up with Democrats, but with Republicans and independents,

they actually went down strikingly. Like, people don't like. celebrities and politicians getting involved in election. They really don't. I think it actually hurts. Yeah, I agree. But that was after her tour, like, in the middle. She's fine.

She'll be fine. But I don't think she's not hot. Right. She's not unpopular. She's not as hot in the industry now because she just finished a giant tour. So she needs time to, you know, relax and be with that football player.

Who does he? And by the way, they were, when she got booed, They weren't booing her in general. What they were booing was, we don't like you so much in football. Let us just have football.

Let us have one thing without Taylor Swift involved. That's what that was about. I support that. Okay. Cash Patel says he's shutting down the FBI's D.C. headquarters and moving staff across the country. Should other government agencies be doing the same? That's an interesting proposition.

I'm not against that from the get for any. I mean, everything probably is too concentrated in Washington. It's a little too incestuous, right? I have a take on this about the media. I think news organizations should incorporate more bureaus outside of New York, L.A. and Washington. Oh, totally. And Cincinnati and wherever, because the bias in media can't, I'm sure you would agree, can be liberal, but it's, like, less political to me than it is cultural and class-based.

and, you know, I just hire more reporters in Des Moines, hire few reporters in D.C. You wouldn't bother me in the slightest if the Agriculture Department was in Iowa, and the Department of Homeland Security was somewhere. I mean, you know, Washington, there's a concentration of people there who only talk to each other. They live in this little bubble, and I think the longer you're in it, the less you have in common with regular Americans, you put some of those government workers out in the middle of the country, they might have a little bit better understanding of how people are feeling about how their governments operate. Do you work out of Washington?

No, I live in Kentucky. But you contribute to CNN out of Kentucky? Yep, I get up on Mondays. I fly to New York. I do shows there. I come down on the train, and then I go home to Kentucky at the end of the week, and my house is just outside of Louisville. Sounds like you're running.

All right, thank you. All right. Thank you, people. 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.