There’s a lot of going on in the world right now, so it can be easy to neglect one of the more important “lesser” stories out there: The U.S. just lost three of its seven pandas after China asked for them back. Who doesn’t love pandas? This may seem like a sign that all is not well between President Joe Biden and China’s Xi Jingping, but don’t give up hope: Xi singalled that he’s willing to send more pandas our way, as a gesture of “friendship.” It’s this nice story that kicked off the most recent SNL.
In the latest episode’s Cold Open, Mikey Day’s Biden tried to distract the media from some bad news — and, let’s not forget, lots of good news involving a bustling economy that no one wants to talk about — by bringing out Tian Tian, the 26-year old male panda that recently returned home to China. In the sketch, Day’s Biden talked about his recent sit-down with Xi.
“This meeting was a total win,” he averred. “Sure, we made agreements about communications, fentanyl, climate change. But, most importantly, we got the thing America needs right now: More pandas!”
Eventually Yang’s Tian Tian emerged, wondering why he was hogging the spotlight.
“Am I the only one who is surprised that the presidents of the two biggest economies in the world met and everyone’s just like, ‘What’s up with the pandas?’” he said. “I mean, like, I get it: I’m hot, I’m smart, I’m alluringly asexual,” Tian Tian continued. “But there have to be bigger issues, right?”
Biden replied, “Not tonight.”
At one point Tian Tian weighed in on a possible return of Donald Trump to the White House, which he called a “disaster.”
“ He said he’ll round up immigrants and put them in camps. Democracy might end,” he said. “There might be a civil war!”
When asked if he would then be voting for Biden, Tian Tian demurred.
You can watch the sketch in the video above.