Bill Maher blasts press for distorting Donald Trump's Liz Cheney comments: 'Don't lie to me'
"Real Time" host Bill Maher scolded the media for distorting former President Trump's comments about his vocal critic Liz Cheney.
"I woke up today to the headline that Trump had called for a firing squad for Liz Cheney," Maher told the panel during Friday’s installment of his "Overtime" online segment. "And this is what I really don't like about the media. No, he didn't… You don't have to move me to not like Donald Trump more than I already [don't].
"He's criticizing him for being a war hawk. I mean, she is Dick Cheney's daughter," Maher said before reading what Trump said. "Now, of course, he expresses himself horribly. He has to add 'she's a stupid person' because he's a moron… Just to be clear, this is exactly what hippies always said. This is exactly what peaceniks always said. This is ‘Fortunate Son’ the song. It's like, you know what? It's very easy to sit in your building and send young men to die."
"Just don't lie to me," he later continued, "I don't like Donald Trump. Don't lie to me and tell me he wants her in front of a firing squad. He was saying something that, by the way, if it came out of the mouth, some of it, not the stupid part, again, sounds like what hippies used to say about not sending people to [war]."
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"The Fifth Column" podcast co-host Michael Moynihan told Maher that the media gave Trump's team "ammunition" with its coverage, pointing to "chyrons on television" saying that the former president wanted Cheney "executed."
"I mean, at the beginning of that kind of rambling and incoherent thing, he said ‘give her a weapon,' which is not typically something you do to have someone executed," Moynihan pointed out.
"And again, the spirit of it is something that if someone with the blue said it, people would nod along on the left," Maher responded.
"There's plenty of things he says, you don't have to invent them," Moynihan added.
"Yes," Maher agreed.
Even Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Maryland, blasted the media's coverage as "ridicululous, absurd and counterproductive."
At an event in Glendale, Arizona, Trump took a swipe at Cheney, who has been campaigning in support of Vice President Kamala Harris, for being a "radical war hawk."
"I don’t blame [former Vice President Dick Cheney] for sticking with his daughter, but his daughter is a very dumb individual. Very dumb, she’s a radical war hawk. Let's put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK? Let's see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face," Trump said. "You know, they're all war hawks when they're sitting in Washington in the nice buildings saying ‘Oh gee well, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy."
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Several news organizations twisted Trump's comments to suggest he was calling for Cheney's "execution."
The New York Times ran the headline "Trump attacks Liz Cheney using violent war imagery." The Washington Post published "Trump suggests ‘war hawk’ Liz Cheney should have guns ‘trained to her face.’" CNN's headline went even further, reading "Trump says ‘war hawk’ Liz Cheney should be fired upon in escalation of violent rhetoric against his opponents."
The Drudge Report went viral with its top of the page headline in bold red caps, "TRUMP CALLS FOR CHENEY'S EXECUTION."