Karoline Leavitt finally received the Saturday Night Live treatment this weekend, with Ashley Padilla debuting her new impression of Trump’s press secretary in the cold open.
The episode opened with Padilla, as Leavitt, in the White House Press Briefing Room, greeting reporters and telling them, “I am just so excited to be here and answer your friendly questions. As you all know, there was no news this week.”
As the audience laughed, she continued, “Nothing happening with the president. No weird information was revealed. No one had any accusations that rhyme with ‘edophile.’ So I’ll open the floor to questions starting with Kaitlan Collins from CNN who I openly hate, go ahead,” with the camera then cutting to Chloe Fineman as the CNN anchor.
“We definitely need to start with the 20,000 Epstein emails,” Fineman’s Collins replied. ”Why does President Trump’s name appear in so many of them?”
The emails were released earlier this week by the House Oversight Committee, and several contain references to Trump, including one in which Epstein claimed Trump “knew about the girls.”
“You know you suck, right?” Leavitt responded, before attempting to mount a defense of the president’s name appearing in several emails sent by Epstein, arguing, “Look, the only thing these emails prove is that President Trump did nothing wrong. If anything, his crime was loving too much. And possibly too young.”
Leavitt was then offered a softball question by a self-described “unnamed Black guy” from Fox News, played by newcomer Kam Patterson, who asked about the president’s health. “Is President Trump too healthy?” he wondered, earning Leavitt’s gratitude.
“Thank you. And yes, he got his 30th physical last week and it went great. He took a cognitive test and did so well, they said ‘we’d like to see you again as soon as possible,‘” she responded, before being asked yet another question about Epstein by an MSNBC reporter played by Bowen Yang.
“Are you not worried about the optics of Trump giving Epstein’s partner in crime, Ghislaine Maxwell, a sweetheart deal?“ Yang asked, referencing reports that Maxwell was preparing an application for her sentence to be commuted.
“Ghislaine Maxwell said in a sworn deposition she gave to Trump’s friend that Trump always acted like a gentleman,” Leavitt replied. “And a little thing about me? I believe women.”
Exasperated, Leavitt eventually asked reporters if they could move off the topic of Epstein, prompting one, played by Andrew Dismukes, to ask a question about Trump sending money to Argentina so the country’s president Javier Milei could pay off its debts.
“We shall return to Epstein!” Leavitt declared, before Trump himself, played by James Austin Johnson, made an appearance in the press room and hijacked the briefing, answering several of his own questions about his relationship with Epstein and going off on several tangents.
“Jeffrey Epstein, I barely knew the guy, as evidenced by the thousands of pictures of us together, dancing and grinding our teeth at various parties,” Trump told reporters. “Always leering and pointing at something just off camera. Probably a book we’re excited to read.”
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to release all of the Epstein files. This is great. Each file will be on sale for the low, low price of $800.”
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