During the most recent episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, the eponymous host ripped Fox News following their decision to settle a lawsuit for a whopping $787.5 million and didn’t hold back his distaste for Tucker Carlson’s hypocrisy.
Maher brought up the lawsuit multiple times during his show, including during the opening monologue when he mentioned the settlement and stated, “This way they avoided a trial and the harrowing prospect to have to tell the truth.”
Maher also took a moment to blast Tucker Carlson, referring to Carlson’s text messages that were revealed last week, where — as Maher explained — Carlson called Trump’s lawyer, Sidney Powell, “A fu**ing bit**, a psychopath, a liar and a cu**,” only to praise her on his Fox News show Tucker Carlson Tonight. Maher also noted that those texts were the last straw for Fox News having any chance at winning a trial.
He also added that Carlson and his fellow anchors were “toeing the Trump line. Yet, behind the scenes they knew it was bullsh**!”
Although they settled with Dominion Voting Systems — the company that sued Fox News over their claims that the election was rigged — the network’s legal troubles are not over, as Fox News is battling another similar lawsuit involving a election technology company called Smartmatic. It’s almost guaranteed to cost Fox News another fortune since Smartmatic has already stated they will settle for no less than the same price Dominon settled for. Otherwise, they will happily go to trial, one that very few people think Fox News can win.
Later in his show, Maher made an odd comparison about the network, and anyone who watches Real Time knows that Maher doesn’t shy away from odd comparisons. Last month, he compared Marjorie Taylor Greene to a leprechaun. This time around, he set up his joke by initially explaining that he disagrees with Dominion’s statement that the settlement proves that lies have consequences. Maher countered, “Not really. It proves that lies have a large profit margin.”
Fox News makes over $10 billion dollars a year in profits, though it’s worth noting that less than $2 billion is net profit. Maher then made his comparison, saying, “It’s the cost of doing business. If you run a whorehouse, you gotta buy some Febreze.”
One can’t imagine that Febreze is overly thrilled with such a mention, but they’re probably not complaining either.
Former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly also tore into the network earlier this week, calling their continuous troubles a disaster and penning a public message stating that their “Nightmare will continue.”
Real Time with Bill Maher streams on Friday nights on what is still called HBOMax, soon to be just Max.