Charles Ventura

USA TODAY

After months of begging waiting, Bill Maher finally got his wish: A one-on-one interview with President Obama.

The HBO Real Time with Bill Maher host, who had campaigned for months and launched an online petition to win the POTUS over, sat down for a nearly 40-minute taped interview with Obama that aired Friday night.

Maher and Obama talked about various issues during their White House chat at the Roosevelt Room, including healthcare, marijuana reform and — of course — the presidential election.

When asked how voters will sway on Election Day between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, Obama cited voters “should be really clear" with their choice.

“Every single issue we’ve made progress on in the last eight years is going to be on the ballot in the form of this choice,” Obama told Maher. "Anybody who’s sitting on the sidelines right now, or deciding to engage in a protest vote, that’s a vote for Trump. And that would be badly damaging for this country and badly damaging for the world.”

Obama also expressed his concern regarding the partisanship of news outlets, saying the "Balkanization" of U.S. media leaves the public with "difficulty sorting out what's true and what's not."

“If you don’t have some common baseline of facts … it’s very hard to figure out how we move democracy forward,” Obama said. “If I watched Fox News, I wouldn’t vote for me either.”

The complete interview can be watched below: