At the invitation and arranging of Kid Rock, President Donald Trump had dinner and converation with pundit/comedian Bill Maher at the White House. Welcome to 2025, everyone.

Seriously, try to imagine writing that sentence ten years ago. We live in wild and interesting times. So, how did this dinner party come about, and why did Bill Maher – who insisted that Trump was the worst possible of all options during the 2016 election and the 2024 election – accept a dinner invitation to the White House?

Bill Maher has undergone a bit of a transformation in the last few years. He is still a raging liberal, and proud of it. But what he is not, is “woke.” He, like many other Americans, was content to “live and let live,” but then discovered that the hard left was not interested in that. As Erick Erickson once wrote, “you will be made to care.” That did not sit well with Maher, who learned (as Ronald Reagan did) that the Democrat party was in the process of leaving him. To conservatives and Republicans, Maher became the proverbial broken clock – right twice a day.

But he absolutely loathed Donald Trump. He knew the left was making a huge mistake in pursuing Trump via lawfare, and warned them that it was a bad idea. Obviously, they didn’t listen. He openly supported Kamala Harris while acknowledging that Joe Biden had to step down after the June debate (Maher wanted an open convention because he supported Gavin Newsom, so keep that in mind). And when Trump won in November, Maher tore into the Democrats who were making excuses for Kamala.

That still left Bill Maher with a deep loathing for Donald Trump. So, how did he get all the way to the White House for a dinner?

Liberal comedian Bill Maher ahead of his dinner with President Trump: "I'm honest about the woke train to crazy town and I don't shrink from that…. It's an honor to be invited to the White House."pic.twitter.com/oo5wyHiScI

— Steve Guest (@SteveGuest) March 28, 2025

“I don’t have some sort of complex where I think I can heal America, I can’t. Let’s get that clear — I’m not going to be healing America,” Maher told “The Chris Cuomo Project” podcast. “But if two guys who have been at each other for so long … it’s kind of a Nixon to China thing.”

The pending dinner with Trump was put together by musician Kid Rock, a Trump supporter who has been on Maher’s podcast, “Club Random.”

Maher, a self-described “old school liberal,” said Trump’s handlers probably respect him for criticizing the Democratic Party and losing part of his audience in the process. The Los Angeles-based host of “Real Time with Bill Maher” said he appreciates the honor of being invited to the White House to talk with the president.

“Let’s talk to each other face to face. Let’s stop shouting from 3,000 miles away,” Maher said. “If they expect me to be leaving in a MAGA hat, they’re going to be very disappointed. But I know they don’t.”

He added: “It probably will accomplish very little. But you gotta try, man. You gotta try.”

This entire idea was arranged by Kid Rock, who is a Trump supporter. President Trump, for his part, passed the dinner off as a personal favor to Kid Rock.

“I got a call from a very good guy, and friend of mine, Kid Rock, asking me whether or not it would be possible for me to meet, in the White House, with Bill Maher, a man who has been unjustifiably critical of anything, or anyone, TRUMP,” Trump wrote in a lengthy Truth Social post Sunday night.

“I really didn’t like the idea much, and don’t like it much now, but thought it would be interesting. The problem is, no matter how much he likes your Favorite President, ME, he will publicly proclaim what a terrible guy I am, etc,” Trump said.

The president predicted Maher would behave similarly to the Democrats who protested his speech to a joint session of Congress earlier this month, recalling how they “wouldn’t stand, they wouldn’t applaud, they wouldn’t smile or laugh and, certainly, they wouldn’t be in any way ‘nice.’”

“Who knows, though, maybe I’ll be proven wrong? In any event, I’m doing a favor for a friend. I look forward to meeting with Bill Maher, Kid Rock and, I believe, even the Legendary Dana White will be present,” Trump said of the UFC boss also expected to attend.

“It might be fun or, it might not, but you will be the first to know!” he told his followers.

Well, that dinner happened last night. And while neither Maher nor Trump have said anything yet, Kid Rock was happy to declare the evening a success.

Kid Rock is describing a meeting between President Trump and Bill Maher at the White House as a mind-blowing success, saying his aim in coordinating the get-together between the political adversaries was to model “a little more civility in this country.”

“It could not have been better,” the “All Summer Long” singer said Tuesday in a “Fox & Friends” interview of the confab a day earlier.

Kid Rock, one of Trump’s most prominent celebrity supporters, had arranged the dinner. The trio was also joined by Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO Dana White.

It seems that everyone was well-behaved, and Maher was awed by the White House itself.

And all of them were suitably impressed by the MAGA commander-in-chief, the “All Summer Long” singer claimed. “Trump is the type of person you have to meet him to understand him,” he said.

“Me and Dana said there has never been anyone whoever met the president who has walked away without saying ‘wow, what a great guy.’ [He’s] so funny and engaging and so smart. Bill even said to me after… he goes ‘wow, that was…’ Everybody’s mind was blown, even the president’s.”

“He had never been to the White House,“ he said of Maher. ”The president was gracious. [He] took us up to the private residence, [we] saw the Gettysburg Address in the Lincoln Bedroom.”

The group also pored over their shared hatred of “wokeness,” Kid Rock told the hosts.

“President Trump extended the olive branch and talked about things we had in common. Ending wokeness, securing the border,” he said. “The president was asking him what he thought about policy going on with Iran and Israel and things. It blew my mind. I was very proud.”

While the insight from Kid Rock is important, it will be deeply interesting to hear what either President Trump or Bill Maher have to say after this visit. A face-to-face dinner at the White House, with no cameras, no one to perform for, could have changed their opinions of the other person dramatically. Maher has already anticipated the blowback from the left.

“There will be lots of people on the left who will be like, ‘How dare you talk to this man.’ It’s like f–k you, I’m not playing this game that you mean girls play,” Maher said on his “Club Random” podcast earlier this month.

“‘Oh, you know what? You can’t sit at my lunch table, because I’m just not talking to you.’ Not talking to you? You lost the election. Who the f–k do you think you have to talk to?”

I’m sure that Maher will have plenty to say about his White House dinner on his show this coming Friday. Will it all be complimentary to President Trump? Probably not. But regardless of what happened, Maher has now had a personal experience with Donald Trump and a private tour of the White House. Those kind of experiences can change anyone’s perspective. Kid Rock’s desire for “a little more civility” is a noble aim, and if both men came away from dinner with a new measure of personal respect for the other, then the evening was a success.

Featured Image: White House/Facebook/Public Domain