A few days before the New Hampshire primary, Saturday Night Live He returned with James Austin Johnson as Donald Trump, this time speaking to the press from a courtroom in New York where he was attending one of a number of cases filed for 2024.
“2024 is going to be a very exciting year. “I either go to prison, or become president, or frankly, purge,” Johnson said as Trump said, in an apparent reference to the film series in which all crime is legal for half a day out of the year.
In fact, Trump is expected to be in the courtroom on Monday, the day before the Granite State primary, as he attends the second civil trial brought by E. Jane Carroll. A jury last year found Trump liable for Carroll's sexual assault, and the latest trial was largely aimed at determining damages.
The measures are just a prelude to a year in which Trump faces spending much of the presidential campaign in the courts, with several criminal trials still scheduled even as his lawyers seek to delay them. So far, Trump has taken advantage of the lack of camera access to court proceedings by making lengthy statements to the media just outside the halls, where he has conducted much of his campaign for the nomination in the halls of justice.
“This is the campaign, guys,” Trump-Johnson said. “That's it – I'm screaming in the courtroom, standing behind a barrier like a Guatemalan family in a JFK passenger van.”
In the In a skit, Trump also enjoyed his outburst at the Iowa caucus, where he berated one of his rivals, Ron DeSantis, for his distant second-place showing. “He went to 99 counties but the bitch couldn't win a single one,” he said, while calling the Florida governor “Ron Destopped.” In fact, DeSantis canceled some of his appearances on network morning shows scheduled for Sunday, sparking speculation that he might drop out, but his campaign says it was a scheduling issue ahead of his return to New Hampshire.
Trump Johnson then went on to former rival Vivek Ramaswamy (“He dropped out of the race and agreed to live in my suit pocket”) and current challenger Nikki Haley (“I thought I was done — but I'm back in a big way. I am)” 'em again like I mean girls“.”)
The skit did hint a little at Hawley's line of attack on Trump today — that there are questions about whether he's mentally fit for office. At a rally on Friday evening, Trump mentioned Haley several times when he was actually referring to Nancy Pelosi.
“I'm doing very well, doing very well cognitively,” Trump said in the skit. “I think I'm in great shape. With knowledge, I'm more knowledgeable than ever.
Johnson's imitation is often subtle, especially when he drifts into Trump's streams of consciousness and non-sequiturs, especially those relating to random young celebrities. ((I mean girls. Where is Lacey Chabert? Left out of the remake. very sad.”)
Later in the play, he refers to recorded footage of himself dancing with Jeffrey Epstein. “Boy is that some dark energy,” he said.
But he then claimed that he “wouldn't be surprised if that footage was fake. Of course, it's very real, but you have to think, in many ways, that it can't be.”
“We've seen a lot of success in saying things that didn't happen,” Trump-Johnson said. “I think we will continue to do this. It is an innovation that I am particularly proud of. It seems to work very well. But I love this country and its traditions. That is why I do not do any debates and hardly vote.”
. “Professional creator. Lifelong thinker. Reader. Beer buff. Troublemaker. Evil problem solver.”