Bill Maher says 'my head's not exploding' over Trump picking RFK Jr. for HHS: 'We do need shaking up'
"Real Time" host Bill Maher appeared open-minded about President-elect Trump's nominee for Health and Human Services.
Maher kicked off his interview with physician and author Dr. Casey Means about how people have been "freaking" about Trump tapping Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead federal health policies.
"Well, the system as it is, the way we do health, is already very f---ed," Maher said Friday night. "So maybe he'll make it worse. But, like, my head is not exploding about it."
Means told Maher that she believed Election Day showed that the American people want to address the "chronic disease epidemic" and that RFK Jr. was someone willing to take it on.
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The HBO star pointed to Kennedy's recent comments insisting he wouldn't ban vaccines.
"If you want them, you have them. It's not gonna be mandated. I think that's what a lot of people objected to before," Maher said. "I mean, I've said it many times. There are some pathogens that, if they were going around, I would fight you for the vaccine. And there are others that, you know, I just didn't want, like the one we just had."
Means sounded the alarm on how the U.S. is "the sickest of the top 11 high-income countries in the world" and how life expectancy for an American man is at 73, which she noted was ten years lower than Japan and Switzerland.
"This is something we should all be outraged about," Means told Maher. "And only one party in our election cycle this year was talking about chronic illness. The words ‘chronic illness,’ as far as I know, never came out of the Harris campaign's mouth. And I think that was a real misstep because Americans are, I think, tired of being gaslit about the fact that there's not a problem right now."
"And Trump has asked RFK to do three simple things. He's asked to get the corruption out of the US health agencies, produce uncompromised, evidence-based research for our health guidelines, and reverse the trends of the chronic disease epidemic in two years for children and adults so that we can show up for our 250th anniversary of America stronger than ever. That sounds pretty good to me," she added.
Maher, however, seemed more skeptical about Trump sticking to his campaign promises.
"Trust me, the first time Trump gets a call from some big mucky muck at the pharmaceutical industry and says, 'Hey, you're f---ing with my profits, Trump could easily reverse all of this," Maher said.
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Means remained optimistic, suggesting the president-elect "has been shown some light from RFK about the monumental nature of the American healthcare epidemic, and it has struck a chord with him."
"If you want to say he's a crazy person- he certainly said some crazy s---. He certainly said some crazy s---, but we do need shaking up," Maher later said.
Kennedy endorsed Trump after suspending his own presidential campaign, becoming one of Trump's most prominent surrogates and incorporating the "MAHA" (Make America Healthy Again) movement into his closing argument to voters.