Bill Maher says he’s sitting down for another dinner with President Donald Trump, revealing on his podcast that the two exchanged friendly texts before the second meeting was set.
“I’m having dinner with him again next week,” Maher told Hollywood agent Ari Emanuel on Monday’s episode of “Club Random.”
Maher described how the invitation came out of nowhere after their first dinner, and how Trump reached out directly.
“After the first dinner, I went back to doing what I do… But then, like, he just, out of the blue, let’s have dinner again. And I was like, great. And he was really nice,” Maher said. “Like, I promise I won’t say bad things about you like I did the last time.’ And I texted back, and I said, ‘You know what, you’re the president of the United States. Say whatever the f— you want. I’m just glad we’re talking.’ It’s like being called a ‘hockey puck’ by Don Rickles. It’s just what he does. It’s how he talks.”
Emanuel, who once represented Trump during his “Apprentice” years, told Maher he had spoken with the president that same Monday. Both men agreed that talking with political opponents beats shutting them out.
“It blows my mind that there are people in this world and lots of them on the far left who just would turn this opportunity down, a private dinner in the White House with the president, just a few people, say whatever you want,” Maher said. “I’ve heard people say, ‘Well, I don’t like the war.’ Tell him! You can tell them, and I will.”
Maher used the moment to needle Emanuel’s own client, Larry David, who publicly blasted Maher’s prior White House dinner last year while apparently overlooking his own agent’s ties to Trump.
“It’s so interesting to me that Larry David, like, I’m the devil because I talk to him, but his own agent just talked to him on Monday,” Maher said, as Emanuel sidestepped the subject. “You must recognize the hypocrisy there. Somehow, when it’s his own agent doing the exact same thing, this is, then we don’t play the Hitler card.”
It’s not clear from the podcast whether the dinner has already taken place. Neither the White House nor Maher’s representatives responded to requests for comment.
Maher and Trump spent more than a decade trading public insults before their mutual friend Kid Rock arranged a sit-down that led to a dinner at the White House. Maher later told his audience Trump was more gracious and good-humored in person than he expected, and that Trump showed more self-awareness in private than he lets on publicly. Maher said the subject of the 2020 election came up during his White House tour, and that Trump “didn’t get mad” when Maher raised Trump’s rare acknowledgment that he had lost.
“Look, I get it. It doesn’t matter who he is at a private dinner with a comedian. It matters who he is on the world stage. I’m just taking as a positive that this person exists. Because everything I’ve ever not liked about him was, I swear to God, absent at least on this night with this guy,” Maher said.
“I never felt I had to walk on eggshells around him,” he said. “And honestly, I voted for Clinton and Obama, but I would never feel comfortable talking to them the way I was able to talk with Donald Trump. That’s just how it went down. Make of it what you will. Me? I feel it’s emblematic of why the Democrats are so unpopular these days.”
The private rapport hasn’t stopped public friction. Earlier this year Maher received the Mark Twain Prize from the Kennedy Center, which Trump chairs, and reports surfaced that the White House had tried to block the award. Trump has also repeatedly attacked Maher’s “low ratings” on Truth Social in recent months.
