Bill Maher Compares GOP Congressman Jim Jordan to Dennis Hastert Amid Sex Abuse allegations
Bill Maher ridiculed Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan's alleged role in allowing dozens of teenage boys to be raped or sexually abused by a team doctor during Jordan's previous tenure as Ohio State University assistant wrestling coach.
The Real Time with Bill Maher host on Friday compared Jordan, whom he described as the "Republican impeachment star," to former GOP Congressman and fellow wrestling coach, Dennis Hastert. In a scathing monologue using blunt sexual description, Maher questioned why two "creepy wrestling coaches" went on to become top Republican Party members of Congress. Jordan is accused in lawsuits of allowing the now-deceased team doctor to sexually abuse young boys and male students as he worked alongside him for more than eight years.
"Yeah, yeah, we know," Jordan and the then-OSU wrestling head coach, Russ Hellickson, allegedly replied to one plaintiff who said the team doctor sexually abused him after a 1994 match.
As reported by WKYC, Jordan has adamantly denied the allegations and claimed they are politically motivated. But on Friday, Maher compared the accusations to the 2016 conviction of Hastert, whom a federal judge sentenced to 15 months in prison for pay-off crimes tied to being a "serial child molester," according to The New York Times.
"Jim Jordan, he's a former wrestling coach, who the players say knew that the team doctor was sexually abusing a lot of the players-and he did nothing about it," Maher said. "Now to be fair to Jim Jordan, he is not accused of abusing any of the players himself, he just stood by and did nothing while horrible things happened: so good practice for the hearing."
"This is all 'alleged,' but you know, a million people say it," Maher added.
Maher used his typical twist of comedy and political punditry to blast Jordan, who has become one of the top defenders of President Donald Trump during House impeachment hearings.
"Have you seen the Republican impeachment star, Jim Jordan, of Ohio?" Maher continued. "He always looks like a guy who's about to get in a bar fight and tells somebody, 'hold my jacket.' I believe Republicans keep him in a cage and they feed him Red Bull and crystal meth, they shoot his ass with steroids and then they unleash him on the hearing room."
Maher compared Jordan to Hastert, who in 2016 became the highest-ranking elected official in U.S. history to serve a prison sentence after he was convicted of trying to pay "hush money" to boys he later admitted sexually abusing while he was a Yorkville, Illinois wrestling coach.
Hastert is the longest-serving Republican Speaker of the House in U.S. history, and was released from federal prison in July 2017.
"Jim Jordan is the second wrestling coach turned Republican congressman who has had a sex scandal having to do with the wrestling children," Maher said. "Dennis Hastert anybody?...He was also a creepy wrestling coach. What are the odds?"
A federal lawsuit with hundreds of plaintiffs alleges Ohio State University officials, including Jordan, were aware that now-deceased doctor Richard Strauss was sexually abusing boys as young as 14-15 years old for years and did nothing about the alleged heinous acts. One plaintiff, identified as John Doe 42, said he told Jordan and Hellickson that Strauss masturbated on him in the shower after a match, which the two shrugged off.
"Yeah, that's Strauss," Jordan and Hellickson replied, according to the latest lawsuit. John Doe 42 is the second plaintiff to accuse Jordan of being explicitly aware of sexual abuse and taking no action. Former Ohio State wrestler Dunyasha Yetts was the first to accuse of Jordan of being complicit in the team doctor's alleged crimes.
"It's good that people are starting to come forward and say the truth, which is that Jordan and the other coaches knew what was going on and they blew it off," Yetts told NBC News last week.
"It was common knowledge what Strauss was doing, so the attitude was it is what it is," he said. "I wish Jim, and Russ, too, would stand up and do the right thing and admit they knew what Strauss was doing, because everybody knew what he was doing to the wrestlers. What was a shock to me is that Strauss tried to do that to me. He was breaking new ground by going after a ref."
