Hastily-written cold open sketch

Saturday Night Live opened with a quickly-written sketch about Donald Trump declaring war on Iran.

In the use of the president. James Austin Johnson said: 'Iran has been two weeks away from developing a nuclear weapon for like, the last 15 years or something. So we had to act now, and we’re doing war. War. What is it good for? Districting from the Epstein files.'

He also joked that the strike which hit multiple targets and killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei were timed to cause 'immeasurable fear, rage and chaos in the SNL writers room'.

'They probably had a big State of the Union address thing they were going to do. Not anymore! Jeremy [Culhane] was in it, poor Jeremy, he's got a light show.'

He then introduced Colin Jost as Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.

Published: 1 Mar 2026