Trump, meanwhile, has repeatedly said he believes the show is unfunny, lacks talent and is \u201cjust a political ad for the Dems\u201d nowadays. The sentiment echoes comments he\u2019s made about late-night talk show hosts Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel and their respective shows, each known for skewering Trump. With Season 51 of \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d set to begin Saturday, and recent settlements with media outlets and tech companies making headlines \u2014 YouTube settled a Trump lawsuit<\/a> for nearly $25 million Monday over the suspension of his account \u2014 a renewed focus will be on the show and how it spoofs the president and his policies.<\/p>\n Colbert\u2019s series was canceled by CBS<\/a> in July and will conclude its 10-year run next year in May. While CBS cited financial reasons for its decision to end Colbert\u2019s show, the host was a vocal critic of both Trump and CBS\u2019 parent company, Paramount, which had recently settled a lawsuit with Trump just before the Federal Communications Commission approved its merger with Skydance Media (Colbert called the settlement \u201ca big fat bribe\u201d). <\/p>\n Kimmel was benched by ABC in September after the head of the FCC, a Trump appointee, threatened the network<\/a> over the host\u2019s comments about Charlie Kirk\u2019s suspected killer. Kimmel has since returned<\/a> to the air, and used his first episode back to defend free speech. Colbert and Kimmel also appeared as guests on each other\u2019s shows<\/a> Tuesday, expressing mutual support and cracking jokes at Trump\u2019s expense. Trump has also called for NBC to ax its late-night hosts<\/a> Seth Meyers and Jimmy Fallon, both of whom are \u201cSNL\u201d alums. <\/p>\n Now, \u201cSNL\u201d could be the next target of the administration\u2019s scrutiny. Trump\u2019s posts on social media have previously aired his disapproval for how the series mocks and satirizes him and his administration, and he has suggested investigating NBC as result.<\/p>\n \u201cNothing funny about tired Saturday Night Live on Fake News NBC!,\u201d Trump tweeted in February 2019<\/a>, during his first term in office. \u201cQuestion is, how do the Networks get away with these total Republican hit jobs without retribution? Likewise for many other shows? Very unfair and should be looked into. This is the real Collusion!\u201d<\/p>\n Donald Trump in 2015, the year NBC cut ties after he made comments about undocumented Mexican immigrants.<\/p>\n (Andrew H. Walker \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n Over the years, Trump has had a contentious relationship with the network that once aired \u201cThe Apprentice,\u201d the show that made him a reality TV star, and his Miss Universe pageant. In 2015, NBC cut ties with Trump<\/a> over comments he made about undocumented Mexican immigrants.<\/p>\n \u201cSaturday Night Live,\u201d which celebrated its 50th anniversary<\/a> earlier this year with multiple specials, has been churning out political parodies for decades, and its comedy has targeted leaders from all political backgrounds.<\/p>\n The first time Trump was portrayed on \u201cSNL\u201d was in 1988 by then-cast member Phil Hartman. Since then, a host of actors and cast members have cycled through<\/a> with their Trump impressions, with one of the most memorable being Alec Baldwin, who took over from Darrell Hammond in 2016 ahead of the presidential election. <\/p>\n Trump disliked Baldwin\u2019s portrayal, and wrote in 2018<\/a> that Baldwin\u2019s \u201cdying mediocre career was saved by his terrible impersonation.\u201d Baldwin won an Emmy for supporting actor in 2017 for playing the president. <\/p>\n The \u201c30 Rock\u201d actor\u2019s stint as Trump on \u201cSNL\u201d lasted through 2020, and he made appearances as Trump even when the show was filming remotely<\/a> during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some of his most memorable moments impersonating the president were in cold opens that mocked the debates between Trump and Hillary Clinton<\/a>.<\/p>\n Alec Baldwin in 2017 as President-elect Donald J. Trump during a \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d cold open sketch.<\/p>\n (Will Heath \/ NBC)<\/p>\n In March 2019<\/a>, Trump wrote that \u201cSNL\u201d continues \u201cknocking the same person (me), over & over, without so much of a mention of \u2018the other side.\u2019\u201d The episode that aired the weekend he wrote that tweet was a rerun. \u201cLike an advertisement without consequences,\u201d he went on. <\/p>\n According to reports from the Daily Beast<\/a>, Trump took a step beyond airing his grievances over Twitter that time. He reportedly asked advisors and lawyers in early 2019 about what the FCC, the court system, and even the Department of Justice could do to look into \u201cSNL\u201d and other late-night comedy figures who had mocked him. That inquiry did not amount to any actions, according to the outlet. <\/p>\n In 2022, Trump said the show\u2019s ratings were \u201cHUUUGE!\u201d<\/a> when he hosted, but that they\u2019ve since tapered off. The most recent season of \u201cSNL\u201d was the most-watched<\/a> in three years, with a season average of more than 8 million viewers. <\/p>\n He went on to write that creator and executive producer Lorne Michaels is \u201cangry and exhausted, the show even more so. It was once good, never great, but now, like the Late Night Losers who have lost their audience but have no idea why, it is over for SNL \u2014 A great thing for America!\u201d<\/p>\n Michaels, who rarely gives interviews, reflected on the cancellation of Colbert\u2019s show and what it means for late-night television in an August conversation with Puck News<\/a>. Michaels said he was \u201cstunned\u201d by CBS\u2019 cancellation of \u201cThe Late Show,\u201d but added, \u201cI don\u2019t think any of us are going to ever know\u201d if the decision was political. <\/p>\n \u201cWhatever crimes Trump is committing, he\u2019s doing it in broad daylight,\u201d Michaels went on to say. \u201cThere is absolutely nothing that the people who vote for him \u2014 or me \u2014 don\u2019t know.\u201d He also called Trump a \u201creally powerful media figure\u201d who \u201cknows how to hold an audience.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHis politics are obviously not my politics, but denouncing [him] doesn\u2019t work,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n While many cold opens and \u201cWeekend Update\u201d segments have been dedicated to skewering the president, often making him the butt of jokes, the cold open in the episode immediately following the 2024 election had a different approach. Trump\u2019s opponent, then-Vice President Kamala Harris,<\/a> had appeared on an episode<\/a> just days before the election, but after Trump\u2019s victory, the cast promised they had \u201cbeen with [him] all along,\u201d adding that they all voted for him and supported him<\/a>. <\/p>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re keeping some sort of list of your enemies, then we should not be on that list,\u201d they said before debuting their new Trump impression, \u201cHot jacked Trump,\u201d which featured impressionist James Austin Johnson in a muscle tee and a headband. <\/p>\n Johnson began portraying the president on the series in 2021, and Michaels said he will continue in the role for Season 51. His portrayal mirror\u2019s Trump\u2019s speech patterns and his tendency to veer into tangents about pop culture. Since Trump\u2019s inauguration in January, the cold opens have zeroed in on Trump, focusing on his relationship with Elon Musk and his policies. <\/p>\n The \u201cWeekend Update\u201d segment, hosted by Colin Jost and Michael Che, tends to take sharper jabs the president\u2019s policies and comments, as well as other administration officials. <\/p>\n In the Puck interview, Michaels implied the show wasn\u2019t going to back down, and when he was asked whether political comedy will be tougher in the current climate, Michaels said no. <\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think anybody knows what Michael Che\u2019s politics are,\u201d he said, \u201cbut they do think he\u2019s funny.\u201d<\/p>\n Brendan Carr<\/a>, the chairman of the FCC who has been in the headlines for his role in Kimmel\u2019s benching, wrote in 2020<\/a> that political satire is one of the \u201coldest and most important forms of free speech.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFrom Internet memes to late-night comedians, from cartoons to the plays and poems as old as organized government itself \u2014 Political Satire circumvents traditional gatekeepers & helps hold those in power accountable,\u201d he continued. \u201cNot surprising that it\u2019s long been targeted for censorship.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Trump has said many things about \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d over the years. Few of them are favorable,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":271997,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[69739,15328,101790,141157,13140,171,141156,10754,11171,141155,1030,1807,1747,4370,1933,277,173,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-271996","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-alec-baldwin","9":"tag-cbs","10":"tag-colbert","11":"tag-cold-open","12":"tag-comment","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-first-episode","15":"tag-host","16":"tag-jimmy-kimmel","17":"tag-michaels","18":"tag-nbc","19":"tag-president-trump","20":"tag-saturday-night-live","21":"tag-show","22":"tag-snl","23":"tag-trump","24":"tag-tv","25":"tag-united-states","26":"tag-unitedstates","27":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115304895234753400","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271996\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271997"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/FN3q8jZ04_E\/hqdefault.jpg\")
<\/p>\n