Saturday Night Live mocked President Donald Trump’s cabinet meeting this week in which he allegedly told secretaries they were in charge of their departments — not Elon Musk.
The show’s March 8 episode hosted by Lady Gaga opened with Trump, played by James Austin Johnson, standing in the Oval Office alongside Secretary of State Marco Rubio (Marcello Hernandez) as Trump attempts to broker a truce between the two men.
Rubio has reportedly been furious with the world’s wealthiest man for effectively dissolving the U.S. Agency for International Development through the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, which has led government-wide purges of staff and threatened billions of dollars in federal funds.
“Marco, thank you so much for coming. I know you’re under a lot of stress, but I can’t have you fighting with Elon,” Johnson’s Trump said.
“I need you to be my good little Marco,” he added, saying Marco’s name would have to change to “Mark Ruby” after the president made English the country’s official language.
“If you think I’m going to stand here and let you call me that, you’re right” Hernandez replied.
“But what I don’t accept is Elon having total access to our government,” he said. “Planes are crashing, and he keeps trying to fire air traffic controllers.”
Johnson’s character moved to defend Musk.
“Elon knows a lot about air travel — he runs SpaceX, which is doing incredible things in terms of explosions and with regard to rocket debris,” the Trump character continued, referring to SpaceX’s failed launch Thursday, which resulted in a 400-foot spacecraft experiencing a “rapid unscheduled disassembly.”
The rocket exploded and debris could be seen flying over the Caribbean.
“Elon has been doing a good job with DOGE and he gave me some great stuff to talk about at State of the Union,” Johnson’s character said.
During Trump’s address to Congress this week, he said he would “blame” Rubio if “anything goes wrong” with U.S. foreign policy.
Johnson’s character called Rubio the “the G.O.A.T.”
“You’re the scapegoat, but it’s still a type of goat,” he said.
