Bill Maher Splits with the Left to Blast Dr. Fauci After Explosive Senate Hearing [WATCH]

Bill Maher took aim at Dr. Anthony Fauci on HBO’s “Real Time,” sharply criticizing the former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and the debate about where the virus began, as reported by Fox News.

The comedian and talk show host spoke out days after Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right 111 times during a Senate hearing focused on his pandemic response.

Maher accused Fauci of misleading the public about the origins of the virus, which the article said was responsible for over seven million confirmed deaths worldwide.

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“He was caught in actual lies,” Maher said, adding, “The big issue to me is the origin of this, which is very important. How did it start?”

Maher pointed to Fauci’s earlier claims that the virus came from animal-to-human contact at a wet market in Wuhan, China.

According to Maher, Fauci rejected the idea that the virus could have escaped from a lab even though other scientists were raising concerns.

“And he knew better,” Maher said. He added that Fauci’s diary showed what he was saying to other scientists, who were saying, “No, absolutely.”

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Fox News Digital said it reached out to Fauci for comment.

Maher also addressed the theory that the virus came from either an accidental or intentional leak from a Chinese laboratory in the same city where the first cases originated.

The comedian criticized Fauci over a key issue from the hearing, where he was questioned about National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases funding of controversial research in China.

Fox News Digital said it had previously covered Fauci’s strong denial that the research method, which involves scientists changing the genetics of a virus to better understand and treat it, caused samples to break free from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Maher said the subject should have been open to debate, even as he made clear he would have opposed that type of research. “I think that’s what did happen.”

In June 2025, the World Health Organization released a report stating that “the weight of available evidence … suggests zoonotic spillover … either directly from bats or through an intermediate host.”

Maher then criticized how the lab leak theory became controversial, saying the backlash against discussing it was tied more to social issues than scientific evidence.

“We could have had that debate in a rational way,” Maher said. “We didn’t want to do that. Because why? Because we make everything about race. And this is one of the repercussions in this.”

Maher said the pandemic created a racial stigma around the lab leak theory and made the topic seem unacceptable to discuss.

“You couldn’t say it escaped from the lab, because that was the racist point of view somehow — that the entire Asian continent would have been somehow complicit in this because it escaped from the [lab],” Maher said. “It was ridiculous.”

“But that is where they went,” the comedian continued. “You were racist if you said this escaped from a lab. I think we’ve morphed from a place where we want to obviously not be prejudiced against anybody, to where people of color can never do any wrong.”

The article framed Maher’s comments as a notable break from other left-leaning figures in media who have historically supported Fauci.

Curtis Houck, managing editor of NewsBusters at the Media Research Center, told Fox News Digital that Maher was saying what liberal media figures would not.

“Once again, Bill Maher is willing to level with the country in a way the liberal, elitist media never would,” Houck said. “The press should be capable of calling balls and strikes.”

“But when it comes to most things and their dear Saint Fauci, they must protect him at all costs by either explaining away his damaging diary entries or not covering them at all,” he continued. “The media have made the decision to be joined at the hip with Fauci, even as his credibility has dropped off a cliff.”

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