Chris Rock Has Some Suggestions to Fix the Presidential Process in His SNL Monologue

Saturday Night Live returned last night, and said goodbye to the SNL at Home format it had adopted during the height of COVID-19 quarantine. Naturally, the first episode back in Studio 8H had to be a big one, and it wasted no time jumping back into the swing of things with its debate-themed cold open that featured Jim Carrey’s first turn as Joe Biden. But the show also had a very good host on deck, and Chris Rock wasted no time airing out his thoughts on our broken electoral system.

“I think Joe Biden should be the last president ever,” he said. “Do we even need a president-president, or just figure out a new way to do the job? I mean, what job do you have for four years, no matter what?” He doubled down, adding, “If you hired a cook, and he was making people vomit every day, do you sit there and go, ‘Well, he’s got a four-year deal. We just got to vomit for four more years’?”

Rock expressed his disbelief that the only parameters needed to run for president are to be 35 years old and born in the U.S. “There should be some rules for being a president,” he said. “You realize there’s more rules to a game show than running for president? Donald Trump left a game show to run for president because it was easier. There’s rules to be on Jeopardy!, you can’t just jump on Jeopardy!.”

After saying that the U.S. government, and its congressional system, “doesn’t work,” he offered a few suggestions to fix the process, including term limits for elected officials (“We agreed in the United States that we can’t have kings, yet we have dukes and duchesses running the Senate and the Congress making decisions for poor people”), and encouraged people to vote on Nov. 3 — though he had some notes on that, too.

“The government does not you want you to vote,” he said. “Why do I know they don’t want you to vote? Because Election Day is a Tuesday in November. If this show was Tuesday Night Live, it would have got canceled in 1975.”

SNL continued its political theme throughout the night, with musical guest Megan Thee Stallion using her performance of “Savage (Remix)” to call out misogynoir and speak out against Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron’s handling of the Breonna Taylor case.

“We need to protect our Black women and love our Black women, ’cause at the end of the day, we need our Black women,” Megan said. “We need to protect our Black men and stand up for our Black men, ’cause at the end of the day, we’re tired of seeing hashtags about Black men.”

Kate McKinnon also did her Ruth Bader Ginsburg impression one last time at the end of Weekend Update, paying tribute to the recently deceased Supreme Court justice. In a final shot after the segment had ended, McKinnon, in robe and glasses, put her right hand on her chest and bowed her head slightly. The show then faded into a “Rest in Power” graphic.