Colin Jost brought his acting skills back into play on this week’s episode of Saturday Night Live. He stopped by “Weekend Update” to take on the beleaguered Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, but the segment was anything but gentle on him.
Jost portrayed Hegseth as a flustered and overly aggressive official trying to mask allegations of war crimes linked to a Venezuelan drug smuggling ship. The faux press conference kicked off with, “First of all, where are all the fat people? You get out!”
The impersonation mostly involved Hegseth struggling, quite humorously, to dismiss claims that he ordered a second strike on the boat, resulting in the deaths of two survivors who had been hanging on to debris for about 40 minutes. “Such brutal and ruthless acts have no place in a mass killing operation,” he proclaimed.
He went on to distance himself from the incident, claiming, “I wasn’t even in the room when it happened, right? After the first attack, I was so thrilled I had to make an emergency call to my sponsor. To everyone I met at the anonymous meeting, I’m sorry.”
Ashley Padilla, portraying a reporter, took a jab at Hegseth referencing Sen. Mark Kelly, who called him a “12-year-old playboy.” Jost’s version of Hegseth quickly responded, “Oh, find me a husband.” Padilla’s character fired back, “I’m trying!”
Hegseth grew even more animated as he added, “I’m telling you, if I had a drink for every Venezuelan we killed, I’d have that many.”
In his attempt to defend President Donald Trump, he remarked, “Unlike all you beta guys, he’s a feisty alpha who trusts me and will listen to me no matter what. Isn’t that right, Mr. President?” But the catch was that Trump, played by James Austin Johnson, was sound asleep.
This joke followed a week filled with viral videos showing Trump seeming to doze off during various events. In SNL’s take, he mumbled in his sleep, “Stop it, Mamdani, we can freeze the rent anytime,” before staggering out of bed and shouting, “I wasn’t sleeping! I’m wide awake, can someone please tell me where I am, who I am, and what year it is?”
“Good, Mr. President,” Jost’s rattled Hegseth reassured him. “Everything weird you do is a joke.”
