Friday’s big story on the cable news networks was the guilty plea of Luigi Mangione, the man who shot and killed UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in 2024.
“Luigi Mangione,” Maher said in the opening monologue of HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, “the guy who was getting the runaround from the healthcare system about his bad back? So, he murdered a healthcare executive randomly. That guy. He pleaded guilty in court. He said, ‘I shot Mr. Thompson and I knew what I was doing.’
Maher continued, “And the Mangionistas – that’s what they call the groupies outside the courthouse, they took it hard. One of them said, ‘I don’t think this is a concession or admission of guilt.’ Bitch, he just said that he did it, okay?!”
The punchline, such as it was: “On the bright side, you’ll always know where he is when you call.”
In the court hearing yesterday, during which Mangione changed his plea to federal stalking charges from not guilty to guilty, the now-admitted killer said that “after years of enduring severe pain from a broken back,” he used a 3-D printer to build a firearm. “I shot Mr. Thompson in Manhattan, and he died…I knew what I was doing was illegal.”
Mangione’s state murder trial in the December 4, 2024, killing is slated to begin with jury selection on September 8.
Also in the Real Time opening monologue, Maher took on another big story of the week: Donald Trump‘s ruse of hiding in an airport catering truck to secretly switch planes and evade a potential Iranian missile, leaving unwitting reporters and some White House staffers and cabinet members in the threatened Air Force One.
Said Maher, “He can pull this off and he can’t clean a pool?”
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