Bill Maher has taken aim at President Donald Trump for his “fantastic” trip to China and its impact on U.S.-China relations.
“I can just tell they’re better now. I ordered take out today [and] the menu said go ahead, make some substitutions,” he joked in his opening monologue for Real Time With Bill Maher.
The late-night host didn’t pull any punches in his scathing assessment of Trump’s China trip. Painting the 79-year-old president as easily distracted by pomp and ceremony, and no match for Chinese President Xi Jinping’s negotiating prowess.
“Our two countries have a lot of issues between them,” Maher observed. “But it seemed like in this summit they were mostly avoided. No demands except: you have to try these dumplings.”
He went on to note that Trump appeared to fawn over Xi, praising him excessively.
“Trump says with Xi there’s no games with him. It’s getting a little weird, at one point Xi told his translator: tell Trump don’t catch feelings,” Maher said.
“I’m glad our leaders of these two powerful countries with nuclear weapons aren’t fighting but it’s getting a little personal.”
He said Trump had claimed of Xi that “if you went to Hollywood you couldn’t find in central casting a better guy for it.”
“At one point he said: Xi your hair smells terrific,” he quipped.
Maher pinpointed what he said was Xi’s winning strategy at the summit: distracting Trump with fanfare.
“China knows what Trump likes. What does he like? He likes the pomp, and the parades, and he likes the red carpet, and there was thousands of children waving American flags, and Xi, he’s clever, he knows, he bargained like someone who knows he holds the cards now,” Maher said.
“Ever since Trump backed down on their trade war. In fact as a subtle dig, they served orange chicken.”
He didn’t miss the chance to remind his audience of Trump’s domestic struggles, highlighting the Chinese president’s remarks about America being a declining nation.
“Trump, he doesn’t engage him, he says you know what, when he said declining nation he was talking about Biden’s four years,” he said.
Maher also had words for the many tech CEOs Trump took with him to China.
“Elon Musk was there, the CEO of Apple was there. Very sweet moment when the CEO of Apple was there and he saw all the kids and he said ‘get back to work.’”
He highlighted Trump’s continued profit-seeking behavior, even while in office.
“Interesting side note here: Trump this year has bought and sold millions of dollars in stock in companies that do business with the government. We’re just doing that out front now?” Maher asked.
He finished out his harsh critique with one more blow: “Trump’s defense here is that he uses a blind trust. Yes that’s what he gets from Republicans in Congress. Blind trust.”
