In the non-broadcast portion of Bill Maher's "Real Time" on HBO posted to YouTube, the host and guests Joe Scarborough and Mark Cuban called out Donald Trump's MAGA supporters who have been – and continue to be – ripe targets for Russian President Vladimir Putin's propaganda.
As Cuban pointed out, fans of Trump are pinning their election hopes on a wave of betting on the former president winning re-election based upon a flood of bets on Polymarket before noting that the only people who can make wagers on that site are foreigners. He then joked that Putin was likely using it to beef up support for Trump.
That led Scarborough and Maher to single out supporters of Trump who believe accusations of Russian collusion in the 2016 election was a hoax –– with both adding that it wasn't.
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In the "Overtime" segment, Maher told his guests, "They influence our elections in many ways... I think the biggest hoax going is the idea that the Russian collusion was a hoax."
"It's not a hoax there was collusion," he added. "Just because [special counsel] Bob Mueller was bad at proving it –– there was definitely collusion!"
"That's one of the more maddening things, " Scarborough interjected. "I still read the Wall Street Journal editorial page and the op-eds and it is sort of my go-to in the morning. And it is maddening to see people on there talking about a Russian hoax. And you just want to say: read the Mueller report."
"Read everything that has happened and ask yourself why time and time again Donald Trump is doing things that make no sense," he added. "Why did he say in Helsinki in 2018 regarding Russia, I trust Vladimir Putin more than my intel agencies?"
"It's more dangerous than that," Maher replied. "Because they use it as a jumping-off point to say, 'Well since Russia was a hoax then...' But Russia wasn't a hoax and once you get them to believe that, then anything goes."
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