It may be a dark week for Saturday Night Live, but there’s no rest for its Trump impressionist of record.
James Austin Johnson popped up on this weekend’s Saturday Night Live UK, bringing his Donald Trump across the Atlantic for a special appearance on the British edition of the sketch show.
Johnson popped up in the show’s cold open, which began with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy (Freddie Meredith) meeting British Prime Minister Andy Burnham (George Fouracres) at Downing Street, only for Johnson’s Trump to interrupt the proceedings and quickly take over the sketch.
The setup was a riff on the real-life meeting between Zelenskyy and Burnham on Wednesday, where the two discussed the war in Ukraine and efforts to repair diplomatic ties between Ukraine and the United States.
Johnson’s Trump arrived just as Burnham promised Zelenskyy he would raise his concerns with the president. “Did somebody say Richard E. Grant?” Trump asked before proposing a “Job Swap” in which he would take over the UK and Burnham would inherit the United States. “I tell you, that place is a real mess,” he warned. “You’re gonna hate it.”
From there, Johnson rattled through riffs on small boats, Manchester City, and Percy Pigs before turning his attention to the show he was appearing on. “SNL UK, you’re telling me you don’t have a guy, the whole cast, you don’t have one guy who can play Trump?” he asked. “What an awful situation.”
He also discovered one advantage of doing the impression on British television. After cursing as part of the sketch, Johnson-as-Trump stopped to savor the moment. “Ooh, you can say ‘shit’ on this one,” he said. “That felt really good. Very weird. I feel really weird.”
A source tells LateNighter that Johnson made a brief second appearance as Trump at dress rehearsal—this time dressed in golf attire—at the end of the Michael Jackson fashion-show set sketch. The air version of that sketch excised Johnson’s cameo.
Johnson’s visit marks the franchise’s first-ever U.S.-U.K. current cast crossover. He was preceded by two SNL alums: Tina Fey hosted the series premiere, while Jimmy Fallon dropped by Weekend Update during the show’s first season.
Johnson debuted his version of Trump in the Season 47 premiere in October 2021, shortly after joining the cast as a featured player. His rambling, free-associative take on Trump quickly became one of the show’s most frequently deployed political impressions.
Though nearly a dozen performers have portrayed Trump on SNL over the years—from Phil Hartman and Darrell Hammond to Alec Baldwin—no one has done it more often than Johnson. His 55 appearances on SNL proper put him eight ahead of Baldwin’s 47.
It’s a safe bet Johnson’s Trump will be back on the SNL mothership when the show returns for its next live episode two weeks from tonight—Oct. 31—with host Inde Navarrette and musical guest Gracie Abrams.
Watch SNL UK‘s full Trump cold open at the top of this post.
