Bill Maher Slams US-Born Eileen Gu for Representing a ‘Totalitarian Police State Over America’ at Olympics

Gold medallist Eileen Gu of Team China poses with her medal during the Women's Freeski Halfpipe medal ceremony on Day 14 of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Games in Zhangjiakou, China, on Feb. 18, 2022. Ezra Shaw/Getty Images

Olympic gold medalist Eileen Gu, Lebron James and the NBA, Hollywood stars John Cena and Tom Cruise, and Google: HBO host Bill Maher slammed these names during the latest episode of his show, criticizing them for choosing to support the Chinese regime.

In a monologue on “Real Time with Bill Maher” on Feb. 18, Maher started by criticizing Gu, a San Francisco Bay Area-born freestyle skier who chose to represent China over the United States in the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.

So far, Gu has refused to comment on whether she has given up her U.S. citizenship to be on the Chinese national team.

“Is that cool now, to choose to represent a totalitarian police state over America?” Maher asked. “And by choosing Team China, Eileen Gu became a living symbol of China’s triumph over the West, which wouldn’t bother me so much if I thought China had triumphed over us in the ways that really matter. But they haven’t.”

Gu has earned millions of dollars in endorsement deals from international and Chinese companies. According to Chinese media outlets, her Chinese endorsers include at least three state-run companies—China Mobile, Bank of China, and People’s Insurance Company of China.

China’s hawkish state-run media outlet Global Times has come to Gu’s defense over her decision to represent China. In one opinion article published this month, the outlet accused “U.S. media and American people” of having “adopted a zero-sum mentality” in their criticism of Gu. Another article said such criticism shows that the United States “betrays its own founding spirit.”

Maher said the United States has its own human rights issues, but noted that the country is still “a democracy based on freedom,” whereas China is “an authoritarian surveillance state” that can make people “disappear for a few months” and has “basically jailed an ethnic minority,” in reference to the Uyghurs.

More than 1 million Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, China, are currently being detained in internment camps, where they’re known to be subjected to abuses including torture, forced labor, and forced sterilization. Both the Trump and Biden administrations have designated Beijing’s policies in Xinjiang as “genocide” and “crimes against humanity.”

“It’s a cynical dodge to pretend China’s sins should be overlooked because we all do it. No,” Maher said.

TV Host Bill Maher speaks during the HBO portion of the 2011 Summer TCA Tour held at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, Calif., on July 28, 2011. Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images

NBA, Google, and Hollywood

Maher then turned his attention to the NBA and Lebron James, pointing to the 2019 incident when the Houston Rockets’ then-general manager Daryl Morey voiced support for Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters in a Twitter post.

In response, the NBA issued an apologetic statement, saying Morey’s Twitter post was “regrettable” and “deeply offended many of our friends and fans in China.” However, the league didn’t bow to Chinese pressure to discipline or fire Morey. But James criticized Morey, saying he was “either misinformed or not really educated on the situation.”

“In America, we’re supposed to root for democratic government, not apologize for it,” Maher said, bringing attention to the fact that the NBA has a partnership deal worth $1.5 billion with Chinese tech giant Tencent.

He then brought up James’s response and quipped that “the situation” the NBA superstar was referring to was “I got some shoes to sell.”

“‘Kowtow’ is a Chinese word, but boy, Americans have gotten good at it,” Maher said. “That’s the deal China offers American companies and celebrities: ‘We’ll give you access to our billion-plus consumers as long as you shut up about the whole police-state-genocide thing.’”

Maher also criticized Google, claiming that the U.S. tech giant abandoned its “don’t be evil” motto in favor of “maybe a little evil,” by agreeing to work with China’s censors.

Google once embarked on a secret project known as “Dragonfly,” a censored search engine specifically for the Chinese market. Although the controversial project has been scrapped, the tech giant has also been criticized for choosing to work with China’s Tsinghua University, a school with ties to the Chinese military.

Maher rounded out his criticism by lashing out at Cena, who stars in the latest “Fast & Furious” movie, and Cruise, the star of the “Top Gun” franchise.

Given’s China’s enormous box office, Maher said Cena decided that he “needed to get some reeducation,” like the Uyghurs.

“You see, John referred to Taiwan as a country as if it was a separate country from China, which it is,” Maher said.

The incident Maher described happened in May 2021, when Cena called Taiwan a country during an interview with Taiwanese broadcaster TVBS. He later apologized to Chinese fans in Mandarin after he was excoriated by China’s state-run media for his remark.

John Cena attends Paramount Pictures' Beijing press conference for 'Bumblebee' in Beijing on Dec. 14, 2018. Yanshan Zhang/Getty Images for Paramount Pictures

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) sees Taiwan as a part of its territory—to be united with the mainland by force if necessary. However, the self-governing island is a de facto independent state with its own military, constitution, and currency.

“China would like to do to Taiwan what it did to Tibet and what it’s now doing to Hong Kong,” Mahr said.

He also took exception to the fact that Taiwan’s flag was missing on the jacket worn by Cruise’s character, naval aviator Peter “Maverick” Mitchell, when the “Top Gun” sequel released its trailer in 2019. The jacket’s navy patch showed a Taiwanese flag in the first installment.

“Well, he used to be a maverick; now he does whatever China says,” Maher said.

“Top Gun: Maverick,” scheduled to be released in May, was partly produced by Tencent Pictures, the film unit of Tencent.

Wokeism

“So can you really blame 18-year-old Eileen Gu, who has already made over $31 million as the face of 23 brand products in China, for following in the footsteps of other American celebrities?” Maher asked.

The HBO host said the problem with the Chinese regime lies with modern-day “wokeism.”

“The definition of ‘woke’ was supposed to be being alert to injustice in society. But because the ‘woke’ now see race first and everything else never, fear of being accused of racism has given a free pass on human rights abuses to China and any other places that are perceived as nonwhite,” Maher said.

Vivek Ramaswamy, author of “Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam,” previously told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” that China is using wokeism to erode U.S. democracy. He also said the current wokeism has borne resemblance to old school Chinese communist politics.

“Sorry, Uyghurs. Someone has to tell me where we got this rule that you can’t criticize China, because I suspect we got it from China. Because, after all, it’s where we get everything else,” Maher said. 

Gu’s agent, Tom Yaps, didn’t respond to a request for comment by press time.