Saturday Night Live’s cold open sketch featured a tearful Pam Bondi who remained defiant as she boasted of making history as “the first woman ever to be fired as attorney general.”
Bondi, played by comedian Ashley Padilla, appeared in a NCAA March Madness-themed sketch while Keenan Thompson criticized the government as basketball legend and colorful pundit Charles Barkley.
“Now I’m going to choose my words very carefully here,” Thompson said as Barkley. “As Attorney General Pam Bondi was, and I don’t say this often, terrible. It is a shame when somebody gets fired, but we should all be glad that that freckle-chested dragon lady is gone.”
Padilla then appeared to balance out the argument, “in accordance with Federal Communication Commission guidelines.”
“Hello, gentlemen. It’s so great to be here at the Final Four… years of this country,” she said.
“The truth is, I was amazing at my job and I am proud to say I made history as the first woman ever to be fired as Attorney General,” she said. “I shattered that glass exit door.”
Bondi was unceremoniously fired by Donald Trump earlier this week, with speculation that the president lost confidence in her handling of the Justice Department’s release of millions of files related to Jeffrey Epstein. Her departure also follows his public outrage over the agency’s failure to prosecute his political enemies.
She was reportedly informed of Trump’s decision while riding with the president on the way to a Supreme Court hearing Wednesday.
“I’m so sorry,” said a tearful Padilla. “I just, oh my God, I miss it already. And they threw my headshot in the trash like it was the Epstein files.”
Photos shared online by MS NOW appeared to show Justice Department staffers had indeed thrown Bondi’s portrait into a trash can hours after her departure was announced. Sources told the outlet that many had long-since harbored negative feelings towards the attorney general.
Back on SNL, Padilla’s Bondi was consoled by her fellow basketball pundits who reassured her that she would likely have other opportunities.
“Yeah, you could work in sports. I mean, you already look like a woman’s basketball coach who got suspended for pulling on a player’s braid,” Thompson joked, momentarily breaking character to laugh.
