SNL is More Conservative Than You Remember

I only know a lot about two things - politics and Saturday Night Live. So it’s fun when the two issues come together, although when they meet, it’s typically a situation where people from one area misunderstand the people from the other.

A couple of days ago, I wrote a piece for MSNBC in which I looked at the complicated politics of SNL:

For decades, conservatives have complained that SNL is a liberal nest of snakes, ridiculing traditional Republican values. But as I have watched the entire history of the show, I’ve found dozens of examples where the show actually makes fun of progressivism or supports conservative positions. (More on these later.)

One of the examples I used in my piece is a 2016 Black Jeopardy sketch in which Tom Hanks played a red hat-wearing MAGA follower. As I wrote:

It is assumed that Hanks, playing a red-hatted MAGA enthusiast, will embarrass himself when posed with questions (or “answers,” in “Jeopardy!” style) meant for Black contestants. Yet everyone is shocked when Hanks’ answers comport perfectly with “Black culture,” crystallizing something that had yet to be put into words — politics is a horseshoe, and Trump supporters had more in common with Black Americans than we all thought. (For instance, Hanks’ character, Doug, downplays the importance of voting, saying the outcome of elections are decided months ahead of time, anyway.)

The sketch, which was actually understanding of and sympathetic to MAGA world, actually made the point that support for Trump may be a class phenomenon rather than a racial one. In fact, it was so successful, the show decided to revive it this weekend for the 50th Anniversary show:

But that’s where things get stupid.

During the 2025 version (which also featured Tracy Morgan and Eddie Murphy), the show revives a bit from the original in which the black host, Kenan Thompson, walks over to shake Hanks’ hand, and his character, Doug, recoils.

Immediately, know-nothing MAGAites howled at the show’s disrespect of conservatives.

“Can you imagine being a Hollywood actor who has made their multimillions off of American audiences of ALL political beliefs and then have the audacity and classless disregard to go on SNL and make fun of them…” wrote MAGA fangirl Tomi Lahren on Twitter.

CNN Trump cheerleader Scott Jennings, normally a smart guy, decided to cosplay as a MAGA midwit by posting, “Add another chapter to the book “Why We May Never Lose Again.” Unbelievably offensive. They’ve learned nothing.”

The most generous analysis of all this is to assume team Trump had no idea of the existence of the first sketch, so they didn’t know anything about the context of the Hanks character. They all spent a full night whining about what is perhaps the most favorable depiction of a Trump fan that has ever been on the show.

The more cynical take is that these idiots know full well about the first Black Jeopardy sketch and they’re just trying to stir things up. In MAGA world, they think being on their knees is a position of strength, so they have to constantly pretend they are being victimized by Hollywood liberals.

It is dispiriting that the all the incentives now are for people to mislead people on social media to stoke phony controversies. Most Americans are likely looking for the day when things calm down and we can live our lives without being surrounded by outrage porn.

But there’s no evidence the outrage industrial complex is ever going away. Even if America didn’t have a president that resembled a wolverine on bath salts, a calm, stable nation isn’t possible. No matter how relaxed or boring the world of politics is, there will always be those whose careers and income rely on angering people, whether the threats are real or not. And there is no punishment for perpetuating hoaxes on the public - there is always a new fake outrage around the corner.

Which brings us back to SNL. Sure, the overall tone of the show is liberal, but there has always been content on the show that conservatives can cheer.

For instance, the Black Jeopardy sketch was co-written by Chappelle’s Show veteran Bryan Tucker and current Weekend Update co-host Michael Che, who deserves special credit for skewering liberal conventional wisdom. In the lead-up to the 2016 election, Che was willing to say a lot of the things the show’s left-leaning audience didn’t want to hear. For instance, after one debate in which Hillary Clinton called Donald Trump “the most dangerous person to run for president in modern history,” Che pointed out that Clinton still only polled around five percentage points ahead of Trump. “So let’s not get too cocky,” he warned.

“Trump’s campaign is literally a full diaper,” he added, “and 40 percent of the country is like, ‘well at least he’s not Hillary Clinton.’”

(Shortly after Trump won, Che’s Weekend Update co-host, Colin Jost, joked, “The dating app Tinder announced a new feature this week, which gives users 37 different gender identity options…It’s called, ‘Why Democrats lost the election.’” He then spent the better part of the next week responding to activists claiming he was endorsing “transphobic violence.”)

On Weekend Update, Ana Gasteyer regularly appeared as “Cinder Calhoun,” a send-up of bohemian feminists. More recent cast member Cecily Strong’s greatest character was “The Girl You Wish You Hadn’t Started a Conversation With At a Party,” a risible satire of know-nothing social justice gadflies who are hilariously ignorant about their pet causes.

Some sketches can be considered “conservative” even if they don’t have an explicitly political message. In the famous “Don’t Buy Stuff” sketch from 2006, host Steve Martin and cast member Amy Poehler are perplexed by the idea that one should not buy things if they don’t have the money to pay for them. Back then, Republicans at least rhetorically believed in balanced federal budgets; the sketch seems as if it were dreamed up by former Speaker Paul Ryan and his ilk.

In seasons 40 and 41 of SNL, the show took particular delight in skewering politically correct culture. In one sketch, called “The Dudleys,” it ridicules progressives who complain about sitcom casts that aren’t sufficiently diverse. Another sketch makes fun of the idea of an Asian-American doll, telling the little girls playing with them that they aren’t allowed to do anything that might be stereotypical. The next season, the show ran a sketch featuring a President Hillary Clinton Barbie doll, which little girls didn’t want to play with - the show clearly had picked up on Clinton’s unpopularity well before other liberal media outlets had.

(Also, I have been reminded by readers that SNL had a history of producing right-leaning cast members, like Dennis Miller, Victoria Jackson, and whatever Rob Schneider is these days. Rumor has it that Adam Sandler is a registered Republican and that Chris Farley was pretty conservative, so there is that, too.)

But of course, none of this matters to the people who haven’t actually seen any of the show and just want to watch the world burn.

ALSO:

I wrote a piece for National Review last week that discusses the precedents Donald Trump is setting with his power grab over the past few weeks. Undoubtedly, his political enemies are now salivating at the day they retake the presidency and get to go hog wild as he has:

ALSO:

There’s currently a documentary on Amazon Prime about Tom Green, the young Canadian who used his public access show to rise to fame in America in the late 1990s. It’s a good reminder of how huge Green (former SNL host and husband to Drew Barrymore) got.

And a lot of times, the attention he got was worth it. Here’s the “Slutmobile” gag he played on his parents. Still a classic.

FINALLY:

I’ve been listening to a lot of Colleen Green lately (check out her albums “I Want to Grow Up” and “Cool”), and it just happens she came out with a song in the past few months. So enjoy her rendition of the classic Rupert Holmes song “Escape (The Piña Colada Song.)”