The Saturday Night Live cold open featured Ego Nwodim as Ketanji Brown Jackson, newly confirmed to the Supreme Court, meeting famous women and Black Americans who came before her — along with a few jokes at Ted Cruz’s expense.
In contrast to last week’s Fox & Friends satire, this skit was perhaps less about humor and more about marking her place in history, with Jackson in the Oval Office, awaiting the White House celebration of her historic confirmation, and meeting the ghosts of those who broke the glass ceiling and the color barrier.
When Ruth Bader Ginsburg (played by Kate McKinnon) appeared, Jackson asks her, “I’d love to know what advice you have for me as a woman on the Supreme Court.”
“Okay, here’s my advice. Always label your lunches. So the justices, they got sticky fingers. Second, if you are anything like me, white ladies are going to start wearing buttons of your face.”
Ginsburg the goes on, “Anyway, I just want to say. I’m so proud of you. You’re going to do a great job.”
“Thank you, that means a lot,” Jackson said.
“Look, I know your confirmation process put you through the ringer, but in the end people do the right thing. And you know, i was confirmed in the Senate 96 to 3, so what was your vote?’
“53 to 47,” Jackson said. “Yeah, a lot of them walked out and one guy kept asking me if babies are racist.”
“Ted Cruz?” Ginsburg asked.
“You know it was. You should have seen that man. He actually sat there on Tv and read a children’s book at me.”
“Well, it was Ted Cruz, so I bet the book was called, Goodnight Cancun, and that’s a Gins burn.”
That was a reference to Cruz’s trip to Cancun as his home state of Texas faced a a power crisis and weather disaster.
Cruz was among the Republican senators who, during her confirmation hearings, attacked her sentencing record of those who had been convicted of possession of child porn. In fact, Jackson’s punishments were in line with other judges, liberal and conservative, but the GOP strategy was to try to tar her as soft on child predators. One White House official called it a “QAnon signaling smear.”
The skit opened with Jackson chatting with Joe Biden (James Austin Johnson), who told her, “I promised to put a Black woman on the court, and that is what I did. So that is one campaign promise down and only 74 to go.”
Jackson replied, “I was happy to do my part. World twice as hard as a white man my entire life and then spent an entire week listening to Ted Cruz call me a pedophile.”
In the sketch, Jackson also interacted with Thurgood Marshall (Kenan Thompson), the first Black justice on the Supreme Court; Harriet Tubman (Punkie Johnson) and Jackie Robinson (Chris Redd), who gives off a scream at the seven-figure salaries for today’s baseball players.
“So what advice for me do you have as a person of color on the Supreme Court?” Jackson asked Marshall.
“Well, never give up. Democracy can be slow and messy. It stumbles, but over time, it moves forward. I mean, I was the first Black Supreme Court justice, so you must be what, the 10th, the 20th?”
Jackson replied, “Nope. Just the third.
“No further questions, your honor,” Marshall said.
Check out the sketch by clicking above.