By Katherine Tinsley
7:56am PDT, Jun 24, 2025
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"I never was a Democrat to begin with," Bill Maher told Mission Impossible star Esai Morales. "I always like to caucus with the Democrats and I generally vote for them."
Maher, who is a self-proclaimed independent, has been critical of the shift in the party's values.
"I think, always vote for them, but I always look at it and like no, I'm gonna actually make up my mind, they just always are less scary and insane than the Republicans, but I wait for the day when it evens out," Maher said.
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Bill Maher continues to criticize the rise of "wokeness" within the Democratic Party, but he clarified that he hasn't abandoned the political group, as he was never a part of it to begin with.
"We're approaching that because they have gotten crazier, and that's a lot of what you're referencing," Maher clarified. "But I never said I left the party 'cause I wasn't there to begin with."
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Earlier in their conversation, Esai Morales claimed Bill Maher said the Democratic Party "left" him.
Maher corrected him, noting "didn't say that."
He added that Morales was "conflating what people have said in the past about leaving parties – I know me better than you – you're putting a title on something that somewhat accurately expresses my point of view."
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Bill Maher alleged that Democrats' messaging helped
Donald Trump gain popularity.
"When they see it in a campaign ad, when they see the guy with the Mexican flag and the Waymo burning behind him, it's going to be good for Trump," Maher said.
Esai Morales noted that he agreed with Maher's use of terminology.
"This is brilliant. Somebody is a woke supremacist pretending to be all, what's the word, tolerant, and they're the most intolerant sometimes… and they want to cancel people at the drop of a hat, like that's somebody's living relax," Morales said.
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Despite liking Bill Maher's "woke supremacist" term, Esai Morales shared that he "always identified with the Democratic Party and I still identify as a liberal at heart," adding that his personal "definition of liberal is someone who wants to change the status quo for the better."
