NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” cold open lampooned the classified document scandal facing the country’s law two presidential administrations.
Mikey Day portrayed Attorney General Merrick Garland as an impish crimefighter with tough-guy ambitions.
“I’ll seem like I used to be born in a library, but there’s something it’s best to know: Merrick Garland don’t play,” the fake AG said, after being introduced by a Western inspired theme song punctuated by the sounds of a horse being whipped.
Garland said President Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence’s lawyers had been cooperating with the feds after being busted with top secret documents, but not former President Trump, “whose lawyer put a horse head in my bed.”
When posing the rhetorical query if it was a pressing matter to get well the classified documents from the leaders, Day-as-Garland said “I don’t know, but it surely’s the law. And I’m the law.”
Agents played by Kenan Thompson and Ego Nwodim then stepped to the rostrum to explain how their searches of Pence’s house and the house of Vice President Kamala Harris turned up empty.
At Pence’s house, the one untoward finding was a folder labeled “tax stuff” that turned up photographs of Shania Twain cut out from magazines, Thompson explained.
The present veep’s home was also free from illicit documents.
“Come on now. Joe Biden won’t even give this woman a pen. You think that she has classified documents?,” Nwodim said.
Meanwhile, a star-struck agent played by Bowen Yang was charmed by former President Obama during a surprise inspection of his home.
Obama read Yang a few of the 175 letters he had received from Lin Manuel Miranda, and gushed about how the two-term Democrat ignored a call from Beyoncé during his visit.
Thompson then returned to the sketch to call for justice within the fatal Tennessee police beating of Tyre Nichols on Jan. 10. Five former officers are charged with murder in reference to the incident.
“Hey boss after we done fidgeting with your little papers, we gonna head right down to Memphis and be certain justice is served down there too right?,” the agent asked.
“I sincerely hope so,” Day responded.
Actor Michael B. Jordan hosted the show.
“Michael be hosting. Michael be joking. And truthfully, Michael be nervous, Michael be vulnerable” he confessed to the live audience, while adding “Michael be in therapy.”
After checking out the handsome “Creed III” host was single, Chloe Fineman and Heidi Gardner and Nwodim — wearing a marriage dress — then went to desperate lengths to throw themselves at him, but were rebuked.
Punkie Johnson, a lesbian, said even she was “B-curious” about hooking up with Jordan.
“Even vegans have cheat days right?,” the comedian asked, before shamelessly groping him.
“Weekend Update” returned to the classified document scandal, with Colin Jost noting that Obama and former presidents Clinton and Bush had issued statements saying they weren’t in possession of them.
“Jimmy Carter issued an announcement saying ‘come and get them you bastards,’” Jost cracked, as an over-the-shoulder graphic showed the 98-year-old standing in front of piles of documents wielding a machine gun.
Rapper Lil Baby performed his songs “Without end” and “California Breeze.”
Actor Pedro Pasca can be joined by the band Coldplay on the show’s Feb. 4 episode.
