Friday on HBO’s Real Time, filmmaker and longtime left-wing activist Rob Reiner feigned disbelief at the revelation from host Bill Maher that the media censored coverage of the Hunter Biden laptop scandal in the run-up to the 2020 election.
Reiner’s comments came during a discussion in which Maher mentioned the recent controversy around author Sam Harris’ claim that the media and big tech were justified in censoring the story of Hunter Biden’s “laptop from hell” during the 2020 election in order to stop Trump’s re-election.
“They were talking about the Hunter Biden laptop which was a story,” Maher said, regarding the Sam Harris podcast conversation. “And now all the mainstream press has now admitted it was a real story.”
“So, Hunter Biden’s laptop was buried by the press,” Maher added. “Even the head of Twitter, Jack Dorsey, said that was a mistake. They buried the story because they remembered what happened with James Comey and the letter 11 days before the 2016 election. Comey said we gotta reopen this email investigation with Hillary Clinton. And it probably was—well, she ran a horrible campaign, didn’t go to Wisconsin, we know all of that—but this was probably the last thing that sunk her.”
Maher continued, “So Sam Harris says it was appropriate for Twitter and the heads of big tech and the heads of journalistic organizations to feel that they were in the presence of something that is a once-in-a-lifetime moral emergency, meaning Trump. So, he’s saying it’s okay to have a conspiracy to get rid of somebody as bad as Trump. It’s a little bit of a thorny question because once you go down this road—this is sort of where we are in this country—the other side is so evil, anything is justified in preventing them from taking office. Is it?”
Reiner blathered, “No, you know what’s not justified? Using armed violence to try to kill people in the Capitol. That’s not justified.”
Fact check: the only armed violence in the January 6, 2021 Capitol breach to which he was referring was the murder of an unarmed protester by Capitol police. All the Trump-supporting protesters were unarmed.
“Was it appropriate to bury the Hunter Biden story?” Maher pressed, ignoring Reiner’s attempt to deflect the topic.
“Are you talking about the press doing this?” Reiner asked.
“[Sam Harris] is saying that’s what they did. And this is what they did. They buried the Hunter Biden story before the election because they were like, ‘We can’t risk having the election thrown to Trump, we’ll tell them after the election,’” Maher said.
“And we know for a fact that that’s what they did?” Reiner asked.
“Of course! You don’t follow this?” Maher responded.
“You know for a fact that’s what they did? I don’t know what they did,” Reiner said.
“I know because you only watch MSNBC,” Maher replied, garnering laughter from the audience.
“No, that’s not true. That’s not true,” Reiner insisted.
“Well, then you would know about this,” Maher said.
“I do know about that! I do know about that. And I do watch Fox,” Reiner insisted. “But the point is—we’re going to prove now that the press played, you know, tried to–”
“They’re admitting it!” Maher interrupted.
“The press is admitting it?” Reiner asked incredulously.
“Yes, that’s not even an issue anymore!” Maher replied. “They’re saying, yes, we basically did this because we didn’t want this to throw the election.”
Reiner cannot admit the truth because he is a Leftist, and the Left cannot allow a breach in The Narrative.