During the online-only “Overtime” segment of Bill Maher’s Friday night “Real Time” program on HBO, a viewer asked MSNBC “Hardball” host Chris Matthews whether his willingness to accuse others of racism has ever gotten him into trouble.

“Chris Matthews, are you taking heat for willing to call a comment racist sometimes, before anyone else has raised the issue?” Maher said, reading the viewer-submitted question.

Because politicians sometimes rely on “the racial divide” to “get votes,” Matthews claimed, he has a duty to call out racism wherever he sees it.

“Everybody I’ve met who’s African-American has come up to me, about six inches away from me and very personally said, ‘thank you,’” Matthews said. “I met some people in Mozambique. I met some people in Jamaica. It is an international reality, and everybody feels it on that side of the racial divide, and it’s disgusting that white people to whom the dog whistle is aimed, refuse to acknowledge it, is there. It’s been part of our politics. We thought it was gone. It’s back and it’s being used to get votes.”

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