Ep. #515: Senator Sherrod Brown, Jaime Harrison

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Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO Late Night Series, Real Time with Bill Ma.

Start the clock.

Right here with me.

Thank you.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

You're very kind.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay,

you're great.

I appreciate that.

I know it's exciting.

It's our last show of the year, and it was not an easy not.

I love you too, because it was not an easy year to get through.

We did it together.

I couldn't have done it without you, the viewer, or you, the homeless.

I couldn't.

Well, I mean, you're watching this impeachment thing.

Okay, today was better than Wednesday.

The first day was a little rough.

Today we had Maria Yovanovich.

Did you see that?

She was pretty good.

The former ambassador for the Ukraine, she testified how Trump

smeared her and she felt threatened by him.

And then, while she was testifying to this, Trump shit tweeted

smears and threats while she was testifying to smears and threats, which is witness intimidation, which is an impeachable offense that he committed during his impeachment hearing.

Do you see why I need a vacation?

Yeah, Trump went, this is what he tweeted.

He said, everywhere Maria Ivanovich went, it turned bad.

She started off in Somalia.

How'd that go?

I've seen men blame some stupid shit on women, but Somalia?

You know what else?

She couldn't fix Charlie Sheen's love life.

He's attacking her for surfing in one of the most dangerous spots in the world.

The most dangerous spot he's ever been in is a sand trap.

You know,

I see too many analogies on TV to Watergate impeachment hearings.

This is very different.

Watergate Nixon said, I am not a crook.

Trump says, I'm a crook, so what?

That's a very different situation we're in.

They have no real defense on the facts.

Their defense is, stop picking on the poor guy.

Poor Donald Trump, he was born rich, he doesn't pay taxes, he dodged the draft, he got to be president, in an election he lost.

When is he going to catch a break?

And to distract us from all this today, Trump released a transcript of a different perfect call

to the Ukrainian president.

And in this new call, he doesn't commit a single crime.

That's his defense.

What about all the times I called someone and didn't commit a crime?

This would be like Bill Clinton having the defense.

I'd like to enter in evidence this photograph of Monica Lewinsky not blowing me.

And

Anybody watching this shit?

Okay.

Are you?

Because

have you seen the Republican impeachment star Jim Jordan of Ohio?

He always looks like a guy who's about to get into a bar fight and tells somebody, hold my jacket.

I believe the Republicans keep him in a cage.

They feed him Red Bull and

crystal meth.

They shoot his ass with steroids and then they unleash him on the hearing room.

Jim Jordan, he's a former wrestling coach who the players say knew that the team doctor was sexually abusing a lot of the players and he did nothing about it.

Now, to be fair to Jim Jordan, he is not accused of abusing any of the players himself.

He just stood by, did nothing while horrible things happened.

So, good practice for the hearing.

And

now,

this is all a legend, but you know, a million people say it.

The abusing doctor's name was Strauss, and people kept telling Jim Jordan that this doctor goes into the shower and looks at the players and is masturbating.

And Jordan apparently says, Yeah, that's Strauss.

Funny comeback,

except when you have come on your back.

It's HBO, it's not TV.

What are you so uptight about?

And also, this blows my mind.

Jim Jordan, Representative Jim Borden, is the second wrestling coach turned Republican congressman who has had a sex scandal having to do with the wrestling children.

Remember Dennis Hastert, anybody?

Remember Dennis Haster?

Okay, he went to prison for paying hush money to someone who very credibly said, apparently, because he paid paid hush money, that he was also a creepy wrestling coach.

What are the odds?

I mean, the Democrats have had their scandals sexually, of course, Anthony Weiner comes to mind.

But this fact that the Democrats had two guys who texted pictures of their dick next to a baby.

Oh, I guess you don't remember that about Anthony Weiner.

Good night, ladies and gentlemen.

Nobody remembers that Anthony Weiner texted a picture.

Fuck you.

All right.

On to other news about Republicans.

Boy, let's stick to hitting them, huh?

Roger Stone

got convicted for that.

There he is.

There he is as the penguin.

That's right.

Roger Stone, you know him as Trump's albino assassin.

And

sort of the, he was Trump's political fengali for 30 years, and he is the latest convicted felon to join the Trump crime family in prison.

And besides being an admitted dirty trickster, Roger Stone, you know about Roger Stone?

Kinky.

In fact, when he heard the verdict, he was already in handcuffs.

He was guilty of perjury, intimidation, and witness tampering.

And one of the witnesses that Stone threatened, a guy I used to work with comedy in New York 40 years ago, Randy Credico, got into politics.

I guess he regrets it because Roger Stone threatened him, threatened him that he would take away his dog.

I think this sums up the whole year.

Trumps keep calling this a witch hunt, and yet it's Roger Stone who literally says, I'll get you and your little dog.

All right, we've got a great show done in Brazil.

Frank Bruni and Ian Bremmer are here.

And a little later, we'll be speaking with senatorial candidate Jamie Harrison from South Carolina.

but first up

he is the Democratic senator from Ohio and author of the book Desk 88 eight progressive senators who changed America please welcome senator Sherrod Brown

Senator my pleasure to be here great to see you

love to see you I'm glad really glad to be here well I always enjoy you on TV I always think of you as the Colombo of the Democratic Party

it's the hair you know you're always a little disheveled you should have a raincoat on.

I don't have a raincoat.

But you look like a guy.

I have a suit made by union workers in Cleveland, Ohio.

I just thought I'd.

I love Ohio.

I've been there many times, worked the circuit, worked all the cities there.

Good place.

I love CCR.

Gone.

You know who CCR is, right?

I guess I should.

Creedon's Cleveland.

Oh, Creed that.

They're not from Ohio.

Creedens?

Clearwater is?

They're not from Ohio.

Clearwater is not in Ohio?

There is a town.

There's no,

I'm missing this one.

Proud Mary.

I know the song.

I'm close enough in your age.

I know these songs.

I just don't think of them as Ohio.

I thought Clearwater.

I thought they were.

John Legend, who's been in the show, he's Ohio, Springfield.

All right.

For instance.

Well,

you had John Legend on the show.

John Legend and my wife on the show the same night.

Okay.

I bring up Cretan's.

Well, I don't know why I did.

But I see a bad moon rising.

I see trouble on the way.

But what did you, now, were you here today?

Did you see the, were you flying today?

I actually saw some of the hearings.

You saw some of the hearings.

So, look,

we probably agree, I'm sure we do, on that this is a crime and the Republicans don't care.

That's what we know.

What about politically?

I mean,

this is going to, we know how it's going to end.

He's going to be impeached, then he's going to be exonerated in the Senate, and then he's going to run on, they didn't get me on Mueller, they didn't get me on this, they just want to get me.

What's the plan for this in the forest?

First of all,

Nancy Pelosi, who is

the book that he talked about I wrote, I'd say that Lenon Johnson was probably the best legislative leader in the 20th century, but I'd say Nancy Pelosi is as good or better.

So, first of all, I trust Pelosi.

Second,

when when you bribe a foreign leader, you bribe a foreign leader in order to get a favor, and you're president of the United States, you can't just ignore that.

And that's something even Richard Nixon never did.

So they've got to move forward in the House.

The question, though, and I don't know what's going to happen, I know a lot of senators that I talk to, Republican senators, think Trump quietly.

They'll say Trump doesn't tell the truth.

They'll say Trump, some of them will say Trump's a racist.

They see all that quietly.

They're not likely to do anything about it.

But it also means, though, that the Congress has got to continue to do its work.

The House of Representatives has passed a minimum wage law, a

net neutrality bill, Violence Against Women Act.

They've passed a pension bill.

They've done a number of substantive, important issues on health care and on education, and nothing's happened to the Senate.

So the question is, the House can do impeachment as they should and

bring the articles of impeachment.

The Senate needs to do its job legislatively and simply has failed to do that.

And there's no reason.

So Democrats continue to talk about that.

And

they're nervous.

So they should talk about it.

They do, and we do.

But I understand the media is going to pay a lot more attention to hearings with an ambassador that Trump fired and all the things that Rudy Gigal had.

The media is going to pay more attention to that and not to the substance of legislation that Mitch McConnell will not let become law.

But the pressure is going to build on them.

And next year, impeachment will be over.

There will be some Republicans that vote to remove him, I'll bet you, by then, because they're nervous in their districts.

And then come next year, we talk about the issues.

And the issues are Democrats strongly believe, as a party, in the dignity of work, honoring work, respecting work, wages, consumer protections, if you have pre-existing conditions.

And Donald Trump has consistently betrayed workers.

He won't raise the minimum wage.

He won't fix it.

One after another.

Those are the issues.

It's whose side are you on?

And you make the contrast.

Here's what

Democrats believe in universal health care across the board and Trump's trying to take health insurance away, including for the protection for 2 million people in my state that have a home.

Well, that sounds better than a lot of the people running.

See, this is interesting.

I've had a lot of people here who are running, and I've said to them, why you?

But I feel like with you, the question should be, why not you?

I mean, a lot of people wanted you to run.

You're sort of the description of what they need in the Democratic Party, I think.

You know, someone who's not far left, someone who wins in a state that Trump won handily, right?

But you keep winning in that state, Ohio, which they think has pretty much gone red now.

It's not, it's not, but that's what they think.

Okay.

Okay.

You think the Democrats can win it?

I mean, it's always a bellwether state.

I mean, no.

We're seeing, no Republicans ever won without Ohio.

We're seeing in Ohio, we're doing a number of things from the grassroots up to build young candidates in Ohio.

We've not done well in statewide elections in the last 20 years.

We have something called Lead Ohio to Trade Young People, young candidates.

We have a group that my daughter, who's a city council member in Columbus, has organized around the state of young, particularly young women under 45.

We started something called our Canary Candidates Program and won 35 races this year where I raised some money and come into communities and help.

And that's how we fight back.

But the other thing we do is we show how Donald Trump's betrayed workers.

I mean, Donald Trump went to Youngstown, to Lordstown, and said, don't sell your homes.

We're going to save this plant.

5,000 people lost their jobs because of, in part, not entirely because of him, but in part because of his inaction.

He did not stand with those workers.

He never does.

The White House looks like a retreat for Wall Street executives, except in the days when it looks like a retreat for the gun lobby.

And

it's one time after another.

He's not stood with people.

And Democrats need, I mean, Democrats need to focus on the dignity of work and honoring, respecting work, and what that means, contrasted to Trump's betrayal.

I've heard you.

I've heard you say that a lot of voters in the middle of the country, they don't really trust either party.

They don't think that either party does anything for them.

But they vote Republican because they think

the Democrats are going to do something to them.

They're going to raise their taxes.

They're going to take their guns.

They're going to pass a regulation that hurts their business.

Yeah, I mean,

but you need a strong economic message.

I mean,

I've had a lifetime eff from the NRA.

I have had, I voted, I voted for, I've supported marriage equality for 20 years.

I am 100% pro-choice.

But, and if you look at my, you look at that and you'll say, that guy can't win Ohio.

Well, I win Ohio because I go into communities and I talk about an economic message.

If you believe in using the power of government to help people and people respond to a message about improving their lives.

I go in and I talk about how you can send your kid to Ohio State or to Denison or to community college.

You talk about protecting them so they don't lose their insurance if they're asthmatic or diabetic.

You talk to them about a minimum wage or opportunity for their kids and the overtime rule.

I mean, if you talk to them about those issues, regardless of whether they agree with me 100% on marriage equality or my F from the NRA or being pro-choice,

you win enough of those voters to win the state.

That's how you win the industrial Midwest.

I think it's because because they see you as authentic, which you are.

That's my thing about Colombo.

You know,

I mean that as a compliment.

You know, you got the raspy voice.

You know,

you just look like a guy who's one of them.

And I think the Democratic problem is that they're seen as elitist.

You know, I love Elizabeth Warren, but can she win Ohio?

I think any one of these Democrats that are running can win Ohio if they have a dignity of work message and they contrast it with Trump.

And it's all it's all about.

It's not an albatross around here.

They're taking away private money.

So many plans.

I mean, a lot of people here, I have a plan for everything and they say, wait, this is my life.

I don't want to.

Well, I understand that.

But I also understand Trump.

Trump lost by one vote trying to take away the Affordable Care Act nationally.

He lost by one vote in the Senate when John McCain went like that.

Some of you remember that.

Then later, right now.

Right now,

Trump has gone to court in the federal, the northern district of Texas to try to overturn it.

My state, I worked with a Republican governor, John Kasich, in Ohio.

900,000 people have insurance today that didn't have it.

26-year-olds can be in their parents' plans.

Seniors get huge discounts on their prescription drugs.

All these consumer protections, those are all gone.

So, Democrats, on that debate stage, they all want universal coverage.

They have different speeds or paths to get there.

But make that constant.

Make that contrast between our belief in universal coverage and what Trump wants to do with their health care.

We win if we do it that way.

And, you know, I.

So

you didn't answer my question, why not you?

Well,

to run for president, you got to want it more than anything in the world.

And I take, as you can tell in this interview, I take some joy in the job I do.

One of the people I didn't write about because he didn't have my desk was Hubert Humphrey.

And he had a, they called him the happy warrior.

He had that joy to himself, to his being as a candidate.

I didn't think I would as a presidential candidate.

And I will also tell another, I know it's your job to tell the jokes, but

there was a senator about 60 years ago that said the only cure for the presidential virus in the U.S.

Senate is embalming fluid.

And I didn't want to be one of them.

I made him laugh.

CCR, man.

All right.

CCR, all right.

CCR.

Thank you very much.

I'm a big fan.

Thank you.

I don't know if you get a run this time, but I hope sometime.

Sherrod Brown, everybody.

Senator Sheridan Brown.

All right, let's meet our panel.

Thanks, guys.

Hey,

how are you?

I'm good.

I'm great in here.

All right.

He is the president of Eurasia Group and GZero Media and host GZero World with Ian Bremer on public television.

Ian Bremer is over here.

He is an op-ed columnist for the New York Times.

One of my favorites.

Frank Bruni back with us, Frank.

Great to see you.

And she is a Fox News.

Good for you.

Yes, brave contributor.

former DNC chairwoman and co-author of For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Politics Now in Paperback.

Donna Brazil.

How are you?

It looks like you're ready to go.

Oh, I'm always hot, big.

Every time I get around you, I get a flash.

I don't know what happens in this.

Frank was saying it was cold and...

You're too.

You can find me too.

I'm the one guy that has nothing here.

I must say, every time you run, you actually look younger.

It's like you, Benjamin Button, on this show.

It's pretty amazing.

I turn 60 next month.

Wow.

Yeah, 6-0, baby.

Second anniversary of turning 30.

Wow, yeah.

Talk to the miller, young guy.

She looks like 40.

It's just unbelievable.

Okay, let's get to the issues.

So 81% of the people.

in America have made up their mind about impeachment.

13 million watched.

So we're not doing this for a hell of a lot of people.

And, you know, I think a lot of the people who are watching think this is the impeachment trial.

Yeah.

You know?

And I worry that, okay, we went through this once when the transcripts came out, when we first heard the story, you know, those of us who are following it.

Now we're going through it again with the impeachment inquiry.

Then we'll go through it again with the trial.

It's three times with the same people, the same story.

Do you worry that maybe we're going to match Trump fatigue with investigation fatigue?

Well, if you care about the Constitution, what is it, 230 years old, then I believe that we can spend the time to understand how this impacts our way of life, the rule of law.

Look, no one, no American, is above the law.

What Donald Trump did, or at least what he's alleged to have done, is he put his own personal and political interests above the national security of the United States.

For that reason and much more, more, I do believe the House is right to conduct this inquiry.

And I hope that it goes, I'm an old congressional staffer, so as you know, it's H.R.

660.

That's the bill that allows them to open the inquiry.

Now, after this is over with, the intelligence committee must draw up

their conclusion, present it to the Judiciary Committee, who will then propose the Articles of Impeachment.

So we're still a long way from that final day.

Well, that's what you're concerned about, right?

I mean, we're a long way from that, and it keeps going on and on.

I do think Democrats have to keep this under control time-wise, lest they tax the patience of people who will tune in and tune out and tune out more and more as it goes by.

But I also think we cannot overlook

some of what's happened so far and how powerful it's been.

I think today was an incredibly powerful day.

The contrast between Marie Ivanovich and the tweeting into it president, I think that has to have made a big impression on those Americans who heard about it.

And it's not just the 13 million who tuned in or who are going to hear about that.

Once you go through news coverage, clips being played, it's going to be tens of millions of Americans.

And she came across as some sort of State Department amalgam of Norma Rae and Aaron Brockovich.

You know, I mean, they applauded for her.

I mean, I guarantee you,

I guarantee you, as we're sitting here, Meryl Streep and Olivia Coleman and Julianne Moore's agents are saying, I want the role.

I want to play Marie.

I'm the one guy on the panel that's actually lived in Ukraine.

Really?

I never thought it'd be relevant.

It's still not clear to me that it is.

But she did come across very well, and there's absolutely no question that what we're talking about is an abuse of power.

But I agree with you completely with Sherrod that we're not going anywhere in the GOP Senate.

I do think what's important though is that if there's Trump fatigue, there's Trump derangement, no matter who the Democratic nominee is, it's still, this election is going to be about Trump.

more than it's going to be about the issues.

And if the Dems want to win, they need to actually convince their base and convince people in the swing states that there is an existential threat to the Republic with another four years of Trump.

I think that's the way they win.

No, why are you shaking your head?

No, I think everyone.

One person thought that was right.

No, no,

I mean, Trump is an existential threat.

Absolutely.

But all due respect, at this point in time, he's the most covered president in my lifetime.

People know what they think about him.

And what Democrats have to do to win is say, here's what I'm going to do for you.

And it doesn't center entirely around telling you what you already know, which is the president's giant a-hole.

Well, I'll tell you,

if Warren gets the nomination and the election is going to be about what she is going to do for the population, try winning swing states.

Well, look, there's a poll out just this week in Pennsylvania.

Both Elizabeth Warren as well as Bernie Sanders are leading Mr.

Trump by five points.

Joe Biden is leading by nine points.

So this notion that you cannot run on your values, you cannot run to solve problems, and you have to run just close enough to the middle in order to appease the donors in the Democratic Party.

I think it's a stupid strategy.

We need to have a big conversation about climate change,

about health care.

We may not all agree on how we get that bill, but we need to have this conversation within the Democratic Party.

The other reason I think Biden is doing so well, and one of the reasons I think Pete Buttigieg has done so well, is because they both radiate this quality that Donald Trump has put into retirement, which is decency.

And

I think American voters are so hungry to have decency back in their political life, in their lives.

They're so tired of the ugliness that infiltrates every moment when Donald Trump is in the news and dominating it.

But if I don't mention it, it won't be mentioned on the show.

Today, markets hit yet another record high in unemployment, barely over 3 percent.

I mean, you know, typically when we're all talking about impeachment, that's what most people are actually thinking about.

Right.

Yeah, but you're not talking about income insecurity.

Yes, the markets are reaching every high.

But what about the American who's struggling to pay their bills?

The people who can't afford their insulin.

They're skipping medicine.

And so I

look, I recognize that.

Well, they're the least likely to vote is one answer.

Now, maybe if they had a candidate.

If they had a candidate, right.

Right, who was extremely progressive, maybe the poor would vote.

Because

the campaigns are never aimed at those people.

But it's not just the poor, it's the middle class.

It's a family of four with $22,000 in out-of-pocket expenses.

And God forbid if they get sick, Bill.

I understand.

Don't yell at me.

I get it.

But I just want to, what I never understand about the Trump voter is how they don't get the bait and switch.

I get it why they're fed up sometimes with the Democrats and the left.

Liberals can be crazy and look crazy.

More Americans think that the Democrats have moved too far to the left than think Republicans have moved too far to the right, which is a pretty crazy stat.

Absolutely.

But okay, I get it.

They're fed up.

A lot of people don't follow politics that closely.

They're not watching this show.

They just looked out at the field in 2016 and said, yeah, what America needs is a sex predator in clown makeup.

That's going to make things better, because I don't follow it that closely.

Let's let the dog drive for a while.

But why don't they ever catch on?

I know they talk a lot about how the middle class is being squeezed.

Of course it's being squeezed.

But by who?

Who's doing the squeezing?

When you look at all the policies against the minimum wage

rising,

Republican policy.

Tax cuts for the 1% off the charts.

Republican policy.

Deregulation, which allows monopolies to fall.

People are catching on.

I mean, in the sense that the dog whistle of eat the rich, which is what we see Elizabeth Warren presently doing in terms of her campaign, it's not because she actually thinks she's going to put those policies in place.

It's not because she actually believes that all those policies necessarily work, but it's because she understands that that anger anger is not just going to be channeled by Trump.

And I think that's effective, but it's also really bad for our country.

I mean, maybe it's not as bad for our country as white people first, the Trump dog was, so I buy that, but none of those are going to bring us together.

I mean, this was right before this, I was watching CNN and someone said, I think it was Gergen, saying, this is the worst day of the Trump presidency.

I'm like, he's going to say that again next week.

No, but

it was the most divisive day so far in the United States that I remember you know in my lifetime and that's going to keep happening and I don't see that changing in 2020.

Okay so to change subjects they have a new version of Baby It's Cold Outside.

I don't know if you saw this.

John Legend and Kelly Clarkson recorded it.

It's actually a great, they did a great job on it, but they did it because apparently it was not woke enough.

The original.

Well the original was baby the idea was baby it's cold outside.

Let's come inside and fuck.

You know that was that was it wouldn't it be better to be inside fucking me than being outside in the cold.

That was kind of the idea of the song I was.

I just played something.

I

get a little scotch.

Okay.

So anyway,

so you're making me blush, exactly.

So I thought I'd jump on this bandwagon and I put out my own new album called Bill Maher's A Very Woke Christmas.

Because some of these songs are quite problematic.

Would you like to hear some of the titles?

It has things like

Have They Self a Merry Little Christmas?

A Little Town of Bethlehem that was stolen from the Palestinians.

Oh, yeah, political.

I saw Tommy kissing Santa Claus.

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire are dangerous because some kids have nut allergies.

Away in a manger due to a lack of affordable housing.

Oh yeah.

The drummer boy of size.

Okay.

Frosty the snowman was born with the wrong carrot.

All they want for Christmas is you apologize for blackface in 1987.

Yes.

Oh, come all ye faithful, but not until your partner has climaxed first.

And of course, Santa's got a brand new badge.

Okay, he is a Democratic Senate candidate against Lindsey Graham and the former chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party.

Please welcome Jamie Harrison.

Jamie.

How are you, sir?

I'm good.

How are you?

Great to meet you.

Good to see you.

Okay, so you're going up against Lindsey Graham.

Yes, sir, I am.

Well,

we're going to send him home.

You are?

To Mar-a-Lago or somewhere.

It's very important because it's not just Trump, it's the Senate.

Those are his enablers.

And Lindsey Graham and Mitch McConnell are the two who I would say need to go the most.

So

what is your strategy to get rid of them?

Well, part of our strategy, Bill, is, and you mentioned it earlier, you know, there are a lot of voters who aren't spending all the time watching MSNBC and CNN and all that.

They are not.

And really, voters, when they go in that voting booth, sometimes they find out about a candidate the day or two before that.

But voters vote not just with this, but with this and with this.

Much more.

Exactly right.

And so, what we are doing is we're building a campaign that is focused on talking to the heart and to the gut.

And we're also building a campaign that is focused on helping people, which is a unique thing in politics these days.

I launched a program called Harrison Helps.

It's the only one

in the country, I guess, as a candidate.

And it's focused on going into communities, identifying the challenges that they're having in those communities, and doing something unique, helping them.

So

that's how.

I mean, every politician would say they're helping.

No, but we're actually helping.

So the first thing that we did was a school supply strike.

You know, I grew up.

We all don't trust government.

Reagan used to say the nine most scary words in the English language are, I'm from the government and I'm here to help.

Well, this is the thing.

That's what you have to get past.

This is the thing.

I'm not from the government.

I'm just a candidate running for the government, and I'm going to help them right now.

Okay.

Right?

There's a lot of broken promises in politics.

And so you get politicians who say, well, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that.

I can't make those promises.

I know there are certain things I can do right now to help folks.

I can help people learn how to draft a resume.

I can help people learn how to conduct themselves in a job interview.

I can help first-time college students fill out the FAFSA.

There are things right now that are obstacles to people.

having the American dream that we can do right now that doesn't take a whole lot of money.

It just takes somebody to get get it.

He helped me with my resume.

Well,

I often tell this story.

Well, listen, the problem is that sometimes those people get caught in, as Democrats, we talk about the living wage and all these other things.

My cousin told me once, he said, Jamie, how can a brother just get a job interview?

Right?

Donna earlier spoke about the anxiety within these communities.

And many times as a party, we are talking on this level, and people just need some

plain English and tactics that go to who they are.

You win Colombo.

Yes.

And that's what this campaign is.

So you know Lindsey Graham?

I mean, you're from the United States.

I do, I do.

And I used to have a tremendous respect for Lindsey Graham.

So many people in South Carolina did.

What happened?

Yo, that's a good question.

Lindsey Graham is, you know, I never thought I would quote George Will, but I'm going to do so tonight.

George Will called Lindsey Graham a political windsock.

Yes.

This is a guy who is totally focused on his own personal relevance.

He said that, I am so happy that the president allowed me into his world.

This is the same guy who called the president a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot, right?

And so...

So

in essence, what has happened is that right now, Lindsey is only in this for Lindsay when the people in South Carolina are in desperate need for help.

Our hospitals are closing.

We have had four rural hospitals that have closed in the past seven years.

We got 41 communities in South Carolina who have lead levels higher than the federal standards.

So much is going on in that state, and Lindsey Graham hasn't been back home in South Carolina in two years to do a town hall.

But he's on Fox News every night.

Right, and that's where they see him.

Yeah, more people see on Fox News.

You're on Fox News.

I'm the silver fox.

Yeah, you are.

No, I think that's fantastic.

You've got to go.

Yeah, you got to get it.

You got to get out of the bubble.

Absolutely.

And I see, Lindsay, I see the freedom caucus.

So let me ask this.

The African American vote in 2016 was down for the first time in 20 years.

And they say if Philadelphia, Detroit, and Milwaukee had voted differently, Hillary Clinton would have won those states and the White House.

So

who can bring out that vote?

Who is in this field now who can bring out that vote?

You know, only time will tell, but what African American voters are looking for is the same thing white voters and Hispanic and everyone else.

They're looking for a proven leader and somebody who can not only represent the Democratic Party and our values, but someone who can lead the country.

So I think they want a winner.

They want somebody who can go up against Trump because they want to see Trump defeated.

So it's about a winner.

Oh, they want a winner.

That's why Joe Biden.

And I think that's smart.

No matter what white people think about Joe Biden, black people say, uh-huh, I know know him.

We know him.

We know he can walk the walk.

He can go from a union hall on Saturday and come into church on Sunday.

They know Joe Biden.

And so the other candidates need to go out there and prove that they are willing to do what Joe Biden has done all of his life, and that is fight for people no matter who they are.

That's what they want.

And they know that about Joe Biden.

And they also know that Joe Biden had Barack Obama's back.

Now, hey.

All right.

And Bill, if I can add to what Donna said, she's right on the money.

But Democrats win when we are hopeful and we are aspirational.

This nation is so in need of being brought back together after these years of all of this division and the hate and the rapport.

We all need to sit on a couch.

And

because it's just been that bad.

Well, then maybe the best one is Mayor Pete.

He's the one who, I mean, he's, first of all, he's

surging in Iowa.

In many polls, he's ahead there.

Now, the rap on him was always he couldn't win the African-American vote.

I think he's a- Why is that a rap?

He hasn't been, he needs to come into the hood.

He needs to come into the church.

I mean, that's a bad rap because we're just getting to know him.

I mean, some of my friends are saying, oh, is he Petey?

They're afraid to say his last name because they don't want to mess it up.

I'm there with that.

Okay.

But I do believe that the win of our New Hampshire, the voters in South Carolina will take a good look at it.

Look, Barack Obama was down in the black community in 2008 until he came out of the OWA caucus.

And black folks say, you mean white people like you?

Right.

Exactly.

This is a really important point.

And there's how he's doing right now, and there's how he'll be doing if he emerges as a frontrunner and comes out of Iowa and New Hampshire very strong.

And right now, he's polling tremendously well in those two states.

He's the newest in this field in a lot of ways.

If you think when this race began, everyone knew who Joe Biden was.

A lot of people knew who Elizabeth Warren was because she was pretty big on the national scene.

Bernie Sanders was coming off a very successful 2016 campaign.

In the context of all that, Pete Buttigieg, for all the media attention he has received, is a relative unknown.

So figuring out who he can and can't appeal to, it's a little early.

And America likes new, especially the Democratic Party.

I think they could just be in that mood.

He's really impressive.

Let's try gay.

He's really impressive.

Really, I mean, it's that simple for a lot of people.

And

there's no question that on the debate stage, he impressed people that had never seen him before.

And had he been able to do that?

He's very impressive.

And certainly, in terms of his credentials, understanding Christianity, he can run circles around Pence all day long.

But

I do think that, you know,

third largest town in Indiana, 37 years old.

No one gives a shoal.

I really don't.

I don't think that matters anymore in America.

Donald Trump wasn't the mayor of any town.

He was the mayor of shit town.

Okay, and

nobody cares.

Nobody cares at all.

The brand value around Trump was massive.

He's massively polarizing, yes.

But I mean,

again, people that I talked to are...

You should like Pete for a whole other reason, which is what you've been talking about and you talked about a moment.

Oh, I think.

He's the one who's most directly saying this isn't just about who you elect in November 2020.

This is about what happens the day after.

He doesn't carry the baggage other people do.

And he talks the most directly, and I think the most eloquently, about the need to heal this country after the inauguration.

Again, about

being president not just for the people who voted for him, but for everybody.

Corey Booker is doing that a lot too.

And this is the thing that I want all of you to do.

Who's not scratching on?

Well,

we're still very early in this process.

And it is still fluid.

This is the thing that is very important to me as a former state party chair is it is not just about the White House.

Understand, it is also about the Senate.

It's about the House.

It's about the state houses.

And

so if there's a presidential candidate that's coming in and all they're talking about is themselves, then I don't want to have to deal with any of them because

that is not what we need to do.

That is so true.

We need a leader who can help us take back the Senate to flip more gubernatorial seats.

You know, we flip nine gubernatorial seats.

And speaking of gubernatorial, can I have like

please vote tomorrow in Louisiana?

I know we don't hold elections like everybody else.

We don't make gumbo like anybody else.

But tomorrow's election day in Louisiana, please vote.

See, thank you, Bill.

Thank you.

Okay, yeah, okay.

you.

You got to start thinking down ballot.

And I'm looking at candidates who can carry not just the top of the ticket, but the rest of the ticket.

And the race is still fluid.

I know you're going to ask.

We got more people coming into the race.

What the hell?

I didn't think that was going to happen.

Bloomberg is in.

I thought Sherrod was going to announce here.

I was trying to egg him on.

Yeah, yeah.

I would have went and put my cheerlead off.

Deval Patrick now is.

But this is the point.

This is is the point on Pete, right?

Is that, I mean, Bloomberg, who I'm told by his advisors, is actually going to properly announce on Tuesday,

I mean, he's going to throw an enormous amount of money.

He's going to make advertising incredibly expensive for everybody else.

And he really believes, having spent a lot of time and a lot of money on focus groups, that there isn't a frontrunner and that these second-tier candidates aren't going to make it.

Now, he may be wrong, but I mean,

all I'm saying is there's clearly a lot of weakness in the second tier in the field.

And he may be right that there's no frontrunner, but that doesn't translate into him automatically being the frontrunner just because it's clearly not money.

I just don't see that.

That's not America to go for it.

It's like there's all these people who've been running a marathon for months, right?

And they're at the 10-mile mark.

And Duval Patrick's going to get in because his sneakers are so magic, he's going to catch up.

And Mike Bloomberg is just going to spend a lot of money on a supersonic helicopter to take him to the finish line ahead of everybody else.

And as somebody else, I must tell you, this week, Hillary Clinton said.

She did quit.

Just no.

She got more votes than anybody else.

Well, someone needs to put some Xanax in her hot sauce because

she listened.

Here's her quote.

She said,

I say never, never, never, say never.

I will certainly tell you I'm under enormous pressure from many, many people to think about it.

Yes, those are called Trump supporters.

This is not, this, come on, come on.

Be a little bit more.

we go.

Look, we have enough, we have so many candidates on the debate stage that we need a widescreen television just to see all of them.

I get this.

But I don't want to stop somebody from getting in if they feel the passion and they feel the need.

John Kerry got in late in 2004.

Okay.

But, so, so here's my other point, Bill.

You can say no to Hillary, though.

Yeah, he didn't.

It's okay to say no.

I'm not going to say no to anybody.

That is not my job as a former chair of the party, and it's not his job as an officer of the party.

It's my job.

Don't do it.

If you can say no to Billy.

I can see your question.

If you could say no to Bernie Sanders in 2016, if you can say no to Hillary Clinton in 2021.

I got one more thing I got to bring up.

Nikki Halley this week.

You know who Nikki Haley is?

Okay, I

thought she was

a little bit.

Right.

This is your estate.

Why I wanted you to be here to talk about it.

I mean, I thought she was one of the more reasonable ones.

She She didn't, she kind of acquitted herself in her job at the UN.

She went full-on team deplorable this week.

Show a little of the clip.

This is Nikki Haley this week.

What about his truthfulness?

Did you think he was a truthful person?

Yes, in every instance that I dealt with him, he was truthful, he listened, and he was great to work with.

Show me the proof.

Because I don't see anywhere where the president heavy-handed the president of Ukraine and said, you have to do this or else.

This is the scariest thing this week, because this is somebody who is betting that there is no more Republican classic party, there is only Trump, and she thinks, well, after he's gone, I'll be able to rejoin polite society.

But when you do this, you're destroying polite society.

This is so scary to me.

And

I tell you, you know who I think the nominee is going to be in 2024?

Don Jr.

Yeah, they laughed when I said Trump would win, too.

Because that's what third world dictators do.

He's got to fight Ivanka for it.

Well, you know, Trump.

He's a misogynist.

He'll pick Don Jr.

He wants Ivanka.

You just triggered the whole audience.

Right, well,

Baby Doc and Assad and Kim Jong-un,

this is what they do.

So don't think it can't not happen here.

And this is, I'm just, the last show, I've said it many times, but

just remember, these are the good old days.

One year from now this country is going to be in a shitstorm like we have never seen because he probably will have lost the election Trump and he probably will not leave and what is the plan that's what I want to know from every Democrat what is the plan stand when he does not leave when he says it was fixed it's not fair it's not right and his people you know are just itching to get into the streets there's only one person in dc who's playing asymmetrical warfare the way donald trump is and that's nancy pelosi So I'm going to put it in her hand.

Okay.

All right.

Well thank you panel.

It is time for new rules everybody.

New rules.

Okay new rule now that Kanye West has announced he's changing his name to Christian Genius Billionaire West

and running for president in 2024, Kenston Jr.,

America must change its name to the United States of, oh, what's the use?

Why the fuck not?

New role, the next tedious white guy

who runs for president should just use old pictures of Mark Sanford.

No one wants to vote for you, think about you, learn your boring name, or get to know your stupid fucking face.

So just use Sanford.

It's like that egg Twitter used to use when you didn't give them a picture.

Your slogan could be, egg for America.

And here's your lovely wife, Carol.

New role, the company that's making England's first transgender sex doll with a detachable penis should not do that.

If penises came off, we'd always be losing them.

And

there's nothing more embarrassing than looking to your penis and then realizing it was in your hand the whole time.

New rule, if you need to spray this special toilet perfume in the bowl before you do your business, maybe you need to change your diet.

Clearly, your mouth is writing checks your colon can't cash.

New rule, the woman who went into anaphylactic shock from semen needs to find a less dramatic way to get out of blowjobs.

It used to never be like this, but now it seems like everyone has a nut allergy.

And finally, New Rule, this year, just celebrate Thanksgiving.

Don't try to win it.

And never forget the single shining truth about democracy.

It means sharing a country with assholes you can't stand.

In that way, it's a lot like Thanksgiving.

You don't get to choose the guests because those freaks are your family.

Think about that the next time you think you can own someone politically.

Think about how you can see politics so differently from people who share your very blood.

We have to accept something about people.

Half of them have their taste in their ass.

They eat sweet potatoes with marshmallows.

They wear matching family outfits and put nuts on their truck.

They laugh at Jeff Dunham.

We laugh at Lena Dunham.

46% of the country looked at this

and said,

I want that guy picking the Supreme Court.

We will never understand a brain that thinks like that, and they will never understand worrying about gluten all the time.

Or a Puerto Rican Alexander Hamilton.

That's how you get two completely different headlines about the same thing.

Jim Jordan destroys Dem Star Witness.

Rumor ups in laughter as Democrat Peter Welch destroys Jim Jordan.

We're so divided, it's no longer enough to just make a point.

You have to destroy.

You have to own people.

Except the person who gets owned doesn't change their mind.

They just make a mental note never to interact again with DM me your titties.

We have to drop this fantasy that we can destroy the other side or crush or shred or pulverize them.

Those aren't real things.

They're the middle four settings on the blender that no one has ever used.

America is a big country filled with millions of people who don't think the way you do and never will.

And you can't own, vanquish, or disappear them.

We're stuck with them and they're stuck with us.

They're here, they're annoying, get used to it.

Because

the pendulum always swings back.

Even when we had a civil war and physically owned the South, literally burnt their cities to the ground and occupied their territory, Reconstruction only lasted for 12 years before the mint julep crowd took over again.

And Jim Crow, the KKK, and sharecropping became Slavery 2.0.

We tried to own the Germans after World War I, and that just got us World War II.

Now lately, we've been hearing more and more about a second civil war, which sounds impossible in this modern affluent country.

It is not.

We all talk about Trump as an existential threat, but his side sees democratic control of government the exact same way.

And when both sides believe the other guy taking over means the end of the world, yes, you can have a civil war.

Trump rallies are filled with words like enemies of the people, human scum.

They talk of people to be locked up.

Well, you can't lock us all up.

Liberals are described as weak, lame, coddling, oversensitive, and limp dict,

which are strong words for a bunch of mouth breathers, shit kickers, knuckle-draggers.

Bible thumpers, sister fuckers, and roots.

Yes, I have been guilty of saying things like that, but I'm going to try to stop because I've learned that the anti-intellectualism on the right doesn't come primarily from stupidity.

It comes from hate.

Telling people you think they're irredeemable is what makes them say, you know what?

I'd rather side with Russia than you.

Even if the Democrats win everything in 2020, the Republicans will still be here.

They're not going to self-deport.

They're in Congress, in your office.

Sometimes you're home.

Home is where you learn that the three magic words in any relationship aren't, I love you.

They're, let it go.

Let it go.

You can't you can't own your spouse.

You sometimes just have to make peace with the fact that you're married to someone who believes in ghosts

or won't throw out their baseball cards or thinks essential oils are essential.

Or yes, likes Donald Trump.

We are going to have to learn to live with each other or there will be blood.

So don't freak out if Ellen sits next to George Bush at a football game.

Bush was not my idea of a good president, but I never worried that he was going to lock up his his political opponents or reporters or me.

Bush was wrong, but he wasn't trying to enrich George Bush.

He condemned Islamophobia after 9-11, and he did a lot for AIDS in African countries without calling them shitholes.

He risked Dick Cheney's friendship because he wouldn't pardon Scooter Libby, because it wasn't always just about loyalty.

He stood with Obama when Obama took his job and he said, we want you to succeed.

If you can't see the difference between that and Trump, Democrats are doomed.

Michelle Obama gets it.

She hugs him.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg likes Brett Kavanaugh.

For a country that loves to look at pictures of entirely different species getting along, can't we try it in politics?

All right, that's our show.

We're off for a couple of months.

January 17th, we'll be back.

In the meantime, I'll be at the Blaisdell Center in Honolulu on New Year's Eve.

I want to thank Ian Berner, Frank Ruby, Don of Brazil, Jamie Harrison, and Sherrod Brown.

So stay tuned for YouTube, overtime on YouTube.

Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10, or watch him anytime on HBO On Demand.

For more information, log on to HBO.com.