Bill Maher turned up the heat on Real Time Friday night, pressing guest Dr. Phil over his decision to accompany Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on raids under the Trump administration.
“Why are you going on these ICE raids? I don’t understand that,” Maher asked bluntly, before pointing to the irony. “You’re a guy who we know for so many years who has been working to put families together… And now you’re going on raids with people who are literally separating families.”
Dr. Phil didn’t take the criticism lightly. “Well, now that’s bullsh*t,” he shot back, drawing a comparison to domestic law enforcement. “If you arrest somebody that’s a citizen… with a child in the backseat, do you think they don’t separate that family right then, right there? Of course they do!”
Maher wasn’t buying it, insisting, “That’s not what’s going on.” Moments earlier, he had introduced the segment by calling it “another thing” President Donald Trump is doing while “doubling down on unpopular.”
The former talk show host defended ICE agents, framing his remarks as a direct response to Maher’s opening monologue — which you can watch above — where the comedian criticized masked officers. Dr. Phil argued the masks were necessary after legislators “doxxed” them by posting “their names, their pictures, their addresses… on the internet” and even “on telephone poles.”
He also claimed to have seen “files” justifying the raids. “These are the worst first… child predators that they’re taking off the streets,” Dr. Phil said. “Who would want them back in their communities?”
ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith found partial agreement with Dr. Phil, noting that while he supports “closing the borders,” the administration’s tactics haven’t matched their rhetoric. “Who they have been targeting has been different than what they originally advertised,” he said.
Maher echoed that point, warning that targeting workplaces leaves undocumented people with few options. “If you can’t go to work because you’re hiding, what other recourse is it… except crime?”
Dr. Phil has reportedly joined ICE twice — once during January’s Chicago raids and again for Los Angeles raids in June.
