Bill Maher dedicated the “New Rules” segment of the latest episode of “Real Time” to a tangible, and as he described it, infuriating political problem: Attorney General Merrick Garland.
The HBO host said Garland has basically let Donald Trump off the hook for his many crimes, dismissing him as “a purse dog” who has been “bending over backwards” to avoid doing “his job.” In fact, Maher noted, Garland has apparently been so concerned with appearing to be “fair,” he’s actually been extremely unfair, allowing his boss, President Joe Biden, to be “f—ed” because he’s “bending over backwards to be fair to the Republican.”
You can watch the whole commentary in the video above.
Maher kicked off the segment by dismissing Garland as a guy who got a job “at the top levels of our federal government” because “he got screwed over for another job,” which “isn’t a good reason to give a guy a job, especially if the job as Attorney General, and especially if it’s during a time when we need a tough AG to catch a real criminal.”
Trump is that criminal, Maher meant, and Garland “is that attorney… who SPOILER ALERT, sucks.”
Maher caught viewers up on Garland’s history — how he was President Barack Obama’s nominee for the Supreme Court to replace deceased Justice Scalia in 2016, in accordance with the constitution. “Until Mitch McConnell said f— that, new rule, f— you.”
Maher’s argument is that Garland became Attorney General under Joe Biden as a make-up for how he was unconstitutionally screwed over. “And that’s how we got Attorney General Barney Fife. A man who epitomizes the strange stupor that comes over Democrats whenever they have to choose a top law man.”
“They worry so much about appearing nonpartisan,” Maher continued. “They get behind someone who lets actual crimes go unpunished.” Maher then compared Garland to Robert Mueller, who Maher holds in equal contempt.
Maher then called attention to an oft-commented asymmetry in American politics. “It’s so interesting when it comes time for Republicans to appoint a special prosecutor. They always appoint a Republican, and when it comes time for Democrats to appoint one they also appoint a Republican. A Democrat hasn’t served as a special prosecutor in a major investigation since Watergate. Somehow the rule became it has to be a Republican.”
Maher noted the example of former FBI director James Comey, who “handed the presidency to Trump by making a big announcement 11 days before the election that he was reopening the case into Hillary’s emails, and then found nothing. But the FBI was also investigating the Trump campaign’s constant contacts with Russian nationals at the same time, over 140 of them, but that he kept secret. Weird, huh?”
“Trump whines he’s the victim of selective prosecution,” Maher said. “The truth is he’s the beneficiary of selective non-prosecution.”
As examples, Maher noted Trump’ ongoing New York criminal trial, which he said is “really an election interference case. And Trump is clearly complicit in breaking the same laws that Michael Cohen pled guilty to, and served prison time for. So tell me how can the fixer who delivers the hush money be guilty of election interference, but the candidate who orders it, pays it, conceals it and benefits from it not be. Charles Manson didn’t personally go on the killing spree but he went to prison for it. El Chapo didn’t have the drugs in his ass.”
Maher argued that the issue with the trial is “it’s being tried in the wrong court. If Garland had done his job, Trump would be in federal court charged with breaking campaign finance laws instead of state court charged with falsifying business records.”
Maher also brought up Trump’s classified documents case. Reminding viewers of the specifics, he laid into Garland for not bothering to actually pursue the case with even minimally appropriate urgency. And then he noted how despite dragging his feet for months over investigating Trump, when it came out that Biden also had classified documents, Garland acted much more swiftly.
“By bending over backwards to be fair to the Republican, the Democrat got f—ked,” Maher said, reminding viewers that the special counselor Garland appointed to investigate Biden was a Republican.”
“The upshot in the files cases was to make it look like Biden and Trump were equally guilty which was not true. Biden returned the documents immediately and cooperated fully. So why the need to appoint a special counsel at all? Oh, yes, optics. But of course, the optics wound up being that while Biden was totally exonerated, the Republican counsel took the opportunity to say that the reason Biden wasn’t guilty was it he was too much of a senile, feeble, confused shell of a former man who pooped his pants and can’t remember his kid’s name,” Maher said.
“It took 20 months, 20 months” to appoint a special counselor for Garland to investigate Trump, Maher pointed out. “I know liberals love drag, but maybe don’t do it with the justice system.”
“And now with the most serious of the Trump trials, the one involving his illegal schemes to remain in office, it’s happening again. 59% of Americans, including 26% of Republicans say they want a verdict on this case before the election. But it’s doubtful they’ll get one because for nearly two years our Slow Jam ‘attorney genial’ looked at the statue of Lady Justice and thought I want to be like her: Incapable of moving,” he said.
Garland, Maher continued, is “the embodiment of the liberal judge in every 70s cop movie, The one who always lets the psychopath out on a technicality. And then the psychopath rapes in nursing school and Clint Eastwood has to kill him with a bazooka. But at least the optics were good.”
Watch, as we said, the whole thing above now.