Saturday Night Live leapt into hilarity last night with host John Mulaney bringing a barrel of laughs, while former Talking Heads frontman, David Byrne delivered a stellar set of performances, including a throwback to his 1980 classic, “Once in a Lifetime.” But it was over at the “Weekend Update” desk that anchors, Colin Jost and Michael Che brought it all back to reality, continuing to riff on Donald Trump and his administration’s response to the coronavirus outbreak.
On Wednesday, Donald Trump placed Vice President Mike Pence front and centre at a wide-ranging news conference, stressing the administration’s ongoing efforts and resources devoted to combating the virus. Amid growing criticism of the White House’s handling of the outbreak and mounting fears among Americans, Trump held another press conference on Saturday, announcing new travel restrictions after confirmation of the U.S.’s first case, which has now led to its first death in Washington state. But Jost thought the presser just wasn’t one bit helpful for a big reason.
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“I’m not sure it worked, because according to a new survey, 38 percent of Americans say they won’t drink Corona beer because it sounds like coronavirus. While the rest won’t drink it because it tastes like syphilis,” Jost joked as the audience chuckled.
The comedic anchor went on to dig into Trump, specifically his response over the contagion, admitting how the former reality star turned president is the “worst person to possibly ease people’s fears.”
“Trump’s whole thing is that he whips arenas into a frenzy of anger and bloodlust,” he said. “Hoping Trump can calm people down is liking hoping cocaine can fight insomnia.”
Jost went on to share how he doesn’t “really trust Trump on medical issues” because of the president’s past comments about Ebola: “Ebola, you disintegrated. You got Ebola, that was it,” Trump said per PolitiFact.
“You disintegrated?!” Jost replied to the clip played during the “Weekend Update” segment. “Does he think that Thanos was named Ebola?”
The New York native went on to say Trump, whose rallies are consistently met with “untested people in an enclosed space,” explained his medical plan in very polarizing terms: “We’re ordering a lot of different elements of medical. As you know, they’re working as rapidly as they can on a vaccine for the future. And with that, I think I can head out,” Trump said.
“You think you can head out?” Jost said to laughs. “I’m not sure because you didn’t tell us anything. He said, ‘We’re ordering different elements of medical.’ Which I guarantee you he thinks is fire, earth, wind and water. And now scientists estimate that the mortality rate from the coronavirus is around two percent. Which sounds pretty bad, but honestly if you had given me only a two percent chance of dying in Trump’s first term, I would have taken that in a heartbeat.”
While Jost might have grilled Trump, Che was under fire for his quips about the coronavirus, especially his dig at Crocodile Hunter star, Steve Irwin.
