Last Week Tonight’s John Oliver fancies himself a bold truth truth teller with his HBO show, but the liberal host has been hesitant to take on the Joe Biden sexual assault story, allowing a scant 26 seconds on the topic in the six shows since the allegations went public on March 25. That’s 26 seconds out of 180 minutes for the half hour talk show. In contrast, Oliver savaged Brett Kavanaugh during his nominations, concluding that the “monster” was likely guilty of sexual assault.
On May 3, 2020, five and a half weeks after Reade charged that Biden forcibly penetrated her in 1993, Oliver finally brought it up at the top of the program: “Look, it's been another grim week with news of the global pandemic broken up only by further developments surrounding Tara Reade, the former Senate aide who's accused Joe Biden of sexual assault. Now, he's denied the claim, but there are clearly big questions still to be answered here.”
Oliver concluded, “And Tara Reade obviously deserves to be heard, the way that anyone does when they make the difficult choice to come forward with allegations of this kind, which should, of course, be fully investigated. And I am sure that we will talk more about this as the story unfolds.”
The HBO host quickly changed topics: “But for now, let’s move on to our main story tonight, which yet again concerns the coronavirus.” Would he get back to it the following week? No. Despite the promise to talk "more," it didn’t come up at all. On May 10, Oliver was back to mocking Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr over the Michael Flynn case.
As for Reade, that's it (so far). Twenty six seconds in one show out of six.
How does this contrast to the Kavanaugh accusations? On the September 30, 2018 show, Oliver unloaded on the “unhinged,” “entitled monster.” At one point, he featured a puppet calling for the conservative Supreme Court nominee’s defeat in the Senate:
There is still a chance that we can stop it. So please call your senators tomorrow and tell them you do not want to be looking at this for the next 30 years. Get off the bench! You're not even confirmed yet! No, I don't want a beer! I don't want a beer, you big weirdo! Get off the bench! You entitled monster!
On another show, Oliver trashed Kavanaugh as “Justice Sourpuss J. Boofs-a-lot.” The host has a long history of bashing conservatives. But you might want not want to hold your breath if you’re waiting for him to eviscerate Biden as a guilty “monster” deserving of defeat in November.
A transcript of the May 3 mention is below:
Last Week Tonight
5/3/2020
11:17:00 to 11:17:26
JOHN OLIVER: Look, it's been another grim week with news of the global pandemic broken up only by further developments surrounding Tara Reade, the former Senate aide who's accused Joe Biden of sexual assault. Now, he's denied the claim, but there are clearly big questions still to be answered here. And Tara Reade obviously deserves to be heard, the way that anyone does when they make the difficult choice to come forward with allegations of this kind, which should, of course, be fully investigated. And I am sure that we will talk more about this as the story unfolds. But for now, let’s move on to our main story tonight, which yet again concerns the coronavirus.
