On Friday night, Real Time host Bill Maher welcomed Drudge darling Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) to his late-night show to loud chants of “TUL-SI! TUL-SI!” from the crowd.

“I love you, and I love Hawaii,” offered Maher as soon as they sat down, adding, “I want you to stick around.”

When asked how she thought the party in general looked during the Democratic Debates, Gabbard said that “the format is challenging… but all of this really comes down to who best can defeat Donald Trump.” Well, obviously.

Maher said that, as a passing viewer, his big takeaway was that most Democratic candidates “care about illegal immigrants,” which he thought was a losing issue. And Gabbard again repeated that her big takeaway was “who is the best candidate to defeat Donald Trump.” 

After that, Maher asked Gabbard about Trump’s bro-ing out with Vladimir Putin at the G-20 Summit in Osaka, with Trump both joking about how Putin meddled in our election, and how Putin has a reputation for assassinating dissenting journalists in Russia.

“We have to take seriously the security of our elections because of the vulnerabilities that exist, still, now, that really have the ability to undermine our democracy,” said Gabbard, delivering broad criticisms of election interference but failing to criticize Putin or even mention him by name, even though that was very clearly the question posed by the HBO host. (Gabbard, by the way, is a vocal supporter of the civilian-gassing Assad regime in Syria that is aligned with Putin.)

Later, Maher asked Gabbard where she stood on impeachment. Gabbard punted, saying, “Impeachment is not going to get rid of Donald Trump.”

Overall, an embarrassing performance from interviewer and interviewee.