Bad news for Timothy Olyphant fans: When Saturday Night Live finally cast in the role of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, they hired in-house: castmember Andy Dismukes took on the role.
This week’s cold open started off showing a late-night group chat between three high school girls. Then Dismukes’ Hegseth entered the chat, texting them, “FYI, green light on Yemen raid."
Hegseth spoke the texts out loud as he sent them: “Tomahawks airborne 15 minutes ago. Who’s ready to glass some Houthi rebels? Flag emoji, flag emoji, flag emoji, flag emoji, flag emoji, fire emoji, eggplant.”
When the teens tried to tell him he had the wrong number, Hegseth arrogantly responded, “LOL. Could you imagine if that actually happened?”
He added, “Hey, while I’ve got everyone, sending a PDF with updated locations of all our nuclear submarines.”
Vice President JD Vance soon entered the group chat, once again played by Bowen Yang.
“Praise Trump,“ Vance’s Yang said, referencing a famous recurring line from Severance. “Our work here is mysterious and important.”
Vance also brushed aside the girls’ attempts to explain who they were. He texted them, “Sending a PDF of all deep cover CIA agents. Don’t share!”
Hegseth, still confident, soon texted, “Well, I’m gonna be bad and make myself a Jack and Coke to celebrate. Just the one, though.” It was a reference to the accusations from Democrats that Hegseth may have been drunk when he leaked sensitive info to a reporter.
“Oh, I gotta go,” texted one of the high school girls, played by host Mikey Madison. “Matt’s here to pick me up. We’re going to a movie.”
“Who, Gaetz?” Hegseth asked, referring to former GOP congressman Matt Gaetz, who was put under a House ethics probe for alleged sexual misconduct.
“Actually yes,” Madison replied.
When the girls finally got Hegseth to understand that he’d added three high schoolers to his secret group chat, Vance tried to comfort him.
“Could be worse,” he said. “We could have added the editor of The Atlantic again."
“You did!” texted Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg, played by Mikey Day. He added, “Hegseth, you have got to lose my number.”
