‘Why are they friends?’: SNL dunks on JD Vance and Tim Walz debate

Dana Carvey’s confused Joe Biden returns to SNL to watch the vice presidential candidates ‘debate’

Just days after Senator JD Vance and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz faced off in the first and only vice presidential debate on 2024, the two candidates were back at it again on Saturday night… sort of.

Saturday Night Live’s cold open sketch on October 5 featured a parody of the matchup, with cast member Bowen Yang cast as Vance and guest Jim Gaffigan turning as Walz.

The show kicked off with the “candidates” finding awkward common ground during the “gotcha” portion of the debate.

Yang’s Vance was asked if he regretted calling Donald Trump “America’s Hitler,” to which he replied that the context was important, as he meant it as a “compliment.” Gaffigan’s Walz complimented the Republican for “having an answer for everything.” Fake Vance smiled at fake Walz, leaving the moderator deeply uncomfortable.

“I’m not sure why you two are connecting, but let’s move on,” Heidi Gardner’s Norah O’Donnell said.

The faux Walz was then asked why he said he was in Hong Kong during the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.

Gaffigan provided a reasonable answer.

“So I think what happened was I went to Epcot,” he replied. A few too many drinks in the German portion led the fake Walz to mistakenly think he’d wandered to China.

Bowen Yang’s JD Vance, left, and Jim Gaffigan’s Tim Walz, right, share a tender moment during a parody of the vice presidential debate on “Saturday Night Live” on October 5. (NBC)

After another moment of tender connection occurs between the parody Vance and Walz — then triggering a snippet of the Top Gun love ballad “Take My Breath Away” while they reach out to each other — the scene cuts to Maya Rudolph’s Vice President Kamala Harris spitting her wine and asking “why are they friends?”

“Why are you vibing?” she asks.

Dana Carvey’s Joe Biden — losing track of his thoughts and spouting catch phrases — joined Rudloph before the sketch cut back to the debate, where the candidates were asked about reproductive rights.

After sharing real-world facts about Minnesota’s work to protect women’s abortion rights, Gaffigan’s Walz then admits that due to all of the layering and “lake fish” eating, Minnesota just isn’t a “horny place.”

In the next portion of the sketch, Yang’s Vance insisted that Trump is not “a threat to democracy” because he “peacefully gave over power.”

He then very quickly pointed to the moderator to remind them “we said no fact checking,” which referenced an actual moment during the debate where Vance complained that fact checking was against the rules.

Once Gaffigan’s Walz realizes he can lie during the debate without being fact checked, he walks back a previous statement.

“Well then I would like to say I was at Tiananmen Square,” he says.