‘Saturday Night Live’ Spoofs The VP Debate With A Fact-Check Fearing JD Vance And Goofy Tim Walz
Saturday Night Live brought back almost all of the 2024 election principals for its cold open tonight, in a spoof of this week’s vice presidential debate between JD Vance (Bowen Yang) and Tim Walz (Jim Gaffigan).
The riffs were on the most memorable moments from an otherwise inconsequential 90-minute debate, including when both candidates were asked by CBS News moderators Norah O’Donnell and Margaret Brennan about some of their contradictory past claims.
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“Senator Vance, you called Donald Trump America’s Hitler. Do you regret that?”
As he did in the real debate, Yang’s Vance tried to explain it away. “The context matters. I meant that as a compliment,” he insisted.
Then it was on to Walz. “Governor Walz. You claimed you were in Hong Kong during the Tiananmen Square massacre when you were home in Minnesota. Can you explain that?”
Gaffingan’s Walz answered, “I think what happened is I went to Epcot. You can go around the whole world, and I had a couple in the Germany section, and I thought I went to China. Anyway, I’m a knucklehead.”
In the skit, Kamala Harris (Maya Rudolph) and Doug Emhoff (Andy Samberg) are fretfully watching the debate play out on their TV, with the vice president getting particularly rattled when her running mate starts bonding with Vance, in an event that showcased Midwestern nice.
“I kind of wish I had picked Josh right now,” Harris said to her husband.
“Oh, Josh Shapiro,” Emhoff asked.
“No, Josh … cabernet,” she clarified, pointing to a wine label.
Then, as they watch, Walz said, “I’ve become friends with school shooters.” That really was one of his real gaffes of the evening, and he later said that he meant to say victims.
The skit highlighted Vance’s worst moment, too, as when he was pressed on Trump’s claim that he won the 2020 election.
“Would you have certified the results?” O’Donnell asked.
“You know, Norah, it’s rich to say that Donald Trump is a threat to democracy when peacefully gave over power,” Vance replied, before interjecting, “We said no fact-checking.” Then he went on with further lies. “And [Trump] willingly — don’t check that — got on his plane without incident — don’t — right after saving Obamacare — don’t check that.”
In reality, Vance did complain about the moderators checking him on some of his false claims. CBS News had indicated that the moderators would leave it up to the candidates to fact-check, but the network did not completely shut the door on O’Donnell or Brennan stepping in at some point.
Trump’s false claim that the 2020 election was rigged proved to be Walz’s best moment.
In the skit, he asked Vance, “Will you admit that Trump lost the election.” The Ohio senator replied, “Tim, I’m focused on the future.”
“Boom! It’s good!” Gaffigan’s Walz replied.
Watching on TV, that was relief to Harris, not because Walz won, but because he did not harm. “This is a huge victory. It made no difference,” she said.
Eventually, Harris and Emhoff are visited by President Joe Biden (Dana Carvey) to remind them that all of this debate won’t matter much, as no one can remember past vice presidents. “Who the hell was Obama’s VP?”
The sketch was a return of almost all of lineup that appeared in the season opener, save for James Austin Johnson as Donald Trump, with indications that Rudolph, Samberg, Gaffigan and Carvey would be returning in the remaining weeks until the election.
There was one blooper early on, when Rudolph tripped up on saying the name “Bruce Springsteen.” She caught herself before saying the name correctly.
Kamala and Doug watch the VP debate pic.twitter.com/G6GJbjbwAM
— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) October 6, 2024
More to come.
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