Gone Too Far? Controversial Comic Bill Maher Sparks Liberal Meltdown With Sick Joke About Ex-Veep Dick Cheney's Death
Maher misread the room and upset his 'Real Time' audience with a Dick Cheney death joke.
Nov. 8 2025, Published 1:29 p.m. ET
Blowhard Bill Maher got a taste of how his ultra-liberal Real Time audience truly felt about former right-wing Vice President Dick Cheney when a joke about his death completely bombed.
The comedian, 69, misread his heavily left-leaning audience's opinion about the Republican who, despite his reputation as a war-monger while in office, gained new Democrat fans by bashing Donald Trump in his later years.
Cheney died at the age of 84 on November 3 due to complications from pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease.
One Dead Joke Worked
Maher tried to compare how many people thought both Sliwa and Cheney were not alive anymore.
Maher lined up the Cheney joke by making fun of how some New York City voters likely weren't aware that Guardian Angels founder and Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa was still alive.
Sliwa, 71, became a popular Big Apple figure in the 1980s as his community safety group patrolled the subways and other public areas to fight crime.
Maher joked that Sliwa "was dogged by accusations of: we thought you were dead," while running against eventual winner, Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani, who rode to victory in a landslide.
No Laughs Over Cheney
Maher's joke about Cheney's death bombed with his leftie audience.
"Speaking of we didn't know you were dead, Dick Cheney died," Maher deadpanned as a transition, about another Republican, to which the audience fell silent except for a few groans.
The host appeared shocked and took a few beats before reacting as he very much misjudged his liberal audience.
"How many people thought he was dead? C'mon," the stunned funnyman snarked as his joke brought zero laughs.
Maher tried to move on, seeking humor in the former Halliburton CEO's longtime career in the oil and gas industry.
"Anyway, the most powerful vice president ever, many people have said, and also a simple man who had a simple burial wish," Maher claimed. "He said he wanted to be put in the ground to live his dream of slowly turning into oil."
Maybe a Trump Joke?
Cheney was regarded as influencing many of Bush's foreign policy decisions.
Maher then attempted to get laughs out of Trump sending National Guard troops into several crime-ridden U.S. cities.
He noted how Cheney and Trump "were very different kinds of Republicans."
"Cheney used to send troops to occupy other countries," the New York native joked about the architect of the post 9/11 wars with Iraq and Afghanistan, which Cheney masterminded for his boss, then-President George W. Bush.
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While Democrats hated Cheney while he was in office, he gained left-wing supports by voting against Trump in 2024.
While Cheney was loathed by Democrats during his two terms in office with Bush, 79, he gained a new following among left-wing voters by refusing to endorse Trump for president in 2024 and openly bashing him.
"There has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump," Cheney warned while announcing he was making the rare move of casting his vote for Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
"He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him," the former veep sneered about the January 6, 2020, U.S. Capitol insurrection after Trump lost to Joe Biden.
Cheney added, "He can never be trusted with power again. As citizens, we each have a duty to put country above partisanship to defend our Constitution."
His endorsement of Harris angered Republicans, and Trump went on to secure a second term as president.
