Bill Maher jokes Trump is celebrating Easter by 'locking up guys named Jesus' on 'Real Time' (2025)

Bill Maher spent some time on his show this week focusing on Easter Sunday, mixing in his signature political jabs and seasonal humor—much of it aimed at President Trump and his administration. One of his more biting jokes? He quipped that Trump is observing Easter “by locking up guys named Jesus.”

(That’s “Jesus” with the Spanish pronunciation—a sharp dig at Trump’s immigration policies.)

Opening his monologue with a nod to Good Friday, Maher said, “It’s good Friday, and this is the day Jesus died for all of our sins. So you know what? Have fun. It’s all paid for. You’re playing with the house money.”

Maher also brought up the fact that this week was tax week. Tying that into his ongoing criticism of the Trump-era Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), he said, “one of the things that DOGE has done, it’s kind of gutted the IRS. Oh, you know, you’re not. If you don’t have it, don’t worry about it. Yeah. I mean, I’ll say this, a lot of the things Trump does are really pandering to the base, but letting tax cheats not have to worry about getting audited? That one came from the heart.”

Returning to Easter, Maher joked about the rising cost of eggs: “I don’t want to say the economy is going into the sh***er, but people are dying, dying — yeah, they’re dying too, but dying potatoes for Easter because eggs are too expensive. This sounds like something my Irish relative did after they s*** in the hole and slept in the mud.”

He didn’t stop there, tying together global issues and domestic dysfunction. “So yes, we’re dying potatoes. People are dying overseas because we cut overseas aid. They say… we’re going into a recession, we have a constitutional crisis. Today, Melania had a jacket that said, I’m starting to care,” Maher said. “It’s Easter. It’s Easter on Sunday. Are you excited about that? Oh, my God, my favorite holiday on the Christian [calendar], the day when we celebrate Jesus being resurrected from the dead. Or, as Elon Musk sees it, an elaborate scheme to defraud Social Security.”

Maher circled back with another jab at Trump: “Very big day at the White House. Trump is honoring the day by locking up guys named Jesus,” and added that Trump had also “pardoned Pontius Pilate.”

Shifting his focus to the vice president, Maher poked at JD Vance’s recent conversion to Catholicism, noting, “JD Vance, our vice president, He’s in Rome. You know, he’s a convert, a recent convert to Catholicism. I know it’s married to a Hindu, goes right to the Catholics. I don’t know what that says, But I that he can run into because he heard priests like little pricks,” Maher said. “JD is over there. He wants to get in to see the Pope. It’s not sure he’s gone on to but he’d like to get in there to convince him that Jesus was dead wrong about being nice to foreigners.”

You can catch the full monologue by watching the clip above.