Hunter Biden, 56, apologized to his father “every day” since his addiction battles became public.
Appearing on Friday night’s broadcast of HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, the author and recovery advocate addressed the toll his substance abuse took on those closest to him. Maher, 69, pressed him on whether he had ever expressed regret to former President Joe Biden, 82, for the political ammunition his struggles provided opponents.
“You kind of gave them one. Like you said, ‘I’m a silver platter.’ Did you ever apologize to your father?” Maher asked during the opening one-on-one segment.
Hunter replied without hesitation: “Every day… From the moment it started, every day.”
Expanding on his answer, Hunter reflected on what he called the imbalance of the recovery narrative. While recovering individuals publicly celebrate milestones, he noted, their loved ones often carry unspoken emotional scars.
“It’s one of the greatest heartaches of my life,” Hunter said. “The trouble with recovery is this: I get to get out here and I talk about how I’ve been healed, how I’m stronger than I’ve ever been… [but] the real harm happened to all of the people around them. And the trauma for them goes very, very deep.”
He continued: “And they don’t get to come out on the show and talk about how well they’re doing and everything’s all great. I think about my daughters. I think about [them] every day.”
Hunter referenced a particularly painful period between 2017 and 2019 following the death of his brother, Beau Biden, who died of brain cancer in 2015. He acknowledged the void his addiction created within a family already grieving.
“For a two-year period of time between 2017 and 2019, they lost the most important person in their life and also the other most important person, my brother. And I was not there for them. And I can never make up for that. And same with my dad,” he said.
While speaking about his father, Hunter described their relationship as anchored in what he called unconditional support, though he stressed that parental love did not erase the private anguish Joe Biden endured.
“My dad is unconditional love. It’s not love without consequences. It has… It’s a love that is limitless in this: is that no matter what, he would always be there for me,” Hunter explained.
“But it doesn’t make up for the fact that, you know, every night he had to go to sleep when I was in that state and wonder whether or not I was alive. Just after losing Beau.”
Concluding his thoughts on personal responsibility, Hunter emphasized that making amends is an ongoing commitment rather than a single conversation or gesture.
“Guilt is an appropriate thing,” Hunter said. “It’s absolutely, as the addict, you got to go and you got to make amends as much as you can. And sometimes the greatest amend that you can make is just living a life by doing the next right thing. That’s what I hope I’m doing right now.”
In the viral moment that preceded this appearance, Hunter has spent much of 2026 on an unlikely media tour, sitting down with fierce critics including conservative commentator Candace Owens and far-right influencer Nick Fuentes. In an NPR interview earlier this year, he explained that he sought out these confrontations deliberately.
“I wanted to go into the lion’s den with the people that had pursued me the most vociferously over the past seven years and had said some of the most hurtful things that you can say about another human being,” Hunter said’s Scott Simon in July.
That same interview revealed Hunter has been substance-free for over seven years. He described the public exposure of his addiction — including leaked photos of drug use and personal turmoil — as paradoxically liberating.
“I was given the gift of being so publicly shamed and humiliated, literally stripped bare, in some cases, literally stripped naked in the public square,” he said. “I had nowhere left to hide. I had no more secrets that I could keep. They were all exposed.”
Hunter’s legal troubles culminated in 2024 with federal convictions on gun charges and tax offenses, for which he faced potential prison time before his father issued a full and unconditional pardon in December of that year. President Biden had initially stated he would not pardon his son, but reversed course after losing the election and Donald Trump’s subsequent appointment of Matt Gaetz as attorney general nominee.
Hunter continues his media appearances with another scheduled interview on a podcast this fall.