Howard Stern Banned Adam Carolla for Craziest Reason

Howard Stern is living in the past – March 2020, to be precise.

The radio legend’s fear of COVID-19 is all-consuming. He didn’t leave his home during the pandemic, broadcasting his SiriusXM show from his Southhampton home.

While others masked up and went about their lives, Stern lived in mortal fear of a virus with a very low death rate for his body composition.

He got booster after booster and, finally, emerged from his self-imposed exile last year to dine with his celebrity friends after two long years. And he was a wreck doing it. 

Not Adam Carolla.

The free-thinking podcaster smelled something fishy about the pandemic narratives from the beginning. He carried on as if nothing had changed, played comedy clubs and continued his various podcast programs.

Tell me what I got wrong about Covid. I am all ear’s

— Adam Carolla (@adamcarolla) January 27, 2023

Carolla mocked the notion of mask-wearing on commercial flights, except for the times passengers snacked on the generic treats given out by the flight attendants. He also shredded media outlets for downplaying the age of virus victims, suggesting we were all at near-equal risk from the virus.

Along the way, he threw cold water on the media’s fear merchants, noting that healthy people had little to fear from the pandemic. The elderly and immune-compromised?

That was another story.

He was that rare Hollywood voice that decried lockdowns and vaccine mandates. And Carolla has been proven right, again and again, about pandemic fear-mongering.

That apparently was too much for Stern, who still believes every virus horror story being peddled by his preferred news network … MSNBC.

Guest news anchor Teresa Strasser shared a story about Howard Stern’s reaction to Bill Maher critiquing his love life. Maher suggested it hurt Stern’s former wife’s feelings went he waxed poetic about his current squeeze, Beth Stern, on air.

The radio legend called Maher’s comments “sexist.”

 “That doesn’t seem that harsh,” Carolla noted of Maher’s comments. “I think Howard’s skin is getting a little thinner as he gets older.”

“Have you been on his show in a while? You were great on that show,” Strasser asked. 

“No. I’m no longer welcome on the show because I was right about everything COVID. It’s important that I be punished for being correct about everything COVID.”

RELATED: HOWARD STERN WAVES WHITE FLAG ON FREEDOM

It isn’t unusual for Stern to banish celebrities from his radio show. He previously exiled Gilbert Gottfried, one of the Stern show’s greatest guests, from the program years before the comedian’s 2022 death.

No official reason was given for the banishment.

Stern isn’t the only celebrity to cut Carolla off for his nonconformist views. Longtime friend and show guest David Alan Grier also stopped appearing on Carolla’s show despite being one of the most popular, and memorable, recurring guests. 

Adam addresses DAG's comments made on Stern. https://t.co/by5e2AlKKt

— The Adam Carolla Show (@AdamCarollaShow) January 29, 2019

Grier is liberal, and Carolla’s willingness to call out progressive narratives while staying politically neutral proved too much for the “In Living Color” alum.

Grier told, who else, Stern why he no longer speaks to Carolla during a 2019 radio appearance.

“Adam and I were quite close, but not anymore,” Grier said. “He’s a right-wing troll now. I just can’t hang out with him anymore … I haven’t done his show in years. I just can’t do it anymore.”

Grier then told Stern a story about lecturing a right-leaning Twitter user not to hate him for his liberal views. Stern immediately noted the hypocrisy, which Grier happily confirmed.

Carolla remains a loyal pal to Jimmy Kimmel, his old “Man Show” colleague. Kimmel regurgitates every COVID-19 narrative from his ABC talk show perch, but Carolla says he doesn’t discuss politically-charged issues with his longtime friend.