Kamala Harris makes a surprise appearance on SNL ahead of the election

NEW YORK – Live from New York, a presidential candidate is fighting for every vote in the final days before the election.

vice president Kamala Harris made a surprise trip to New York on Saturday to appear on ” Saturday Night Live“, briefly moving away from the states where she had been campaigning furiously for the iconic comedy show.

Harris took off on Air Force Two after an early evening campaign stop in Charlotte, North Carolina. She was scheduled to fly to Detroit, but when she took off, aides said she would make an unscheduled stop and the plane landed at LaGuardia Airport in Queens.

She appeared outdoors to kick off the show, her campaign confirmed, and the vice presidential motorcade arrived at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, where SNL is taping, shortly after 8 p.m.—plenty of time for a quick rehearsal before the show will be broadcast live on the channel at 23:30

This is the last episode of SNL before Election Day on Tuesday. The episode’s musical guest, pop star Chappell Rohan, announced in September that she was voting for Harris.

Actor Maya Rudolph first played Harris in the series in 2019 and reprized her role she did an exact impression of the Vice President this season, including calling herself “Momala,” a reference to the affectionate nickname her stepchildren call her.

Rudolph opened the show’s season premiere with the line: “Well, well, well. Look who fell out this coconut tree.” And she joked about leaving the president Joe Biden in its place.

Harris’s husband, second gentleman Doug EmhoffHe was played by former actor Andy Samberg, and Biden was played by Dana Carvey, who also famously played then-President George H. W. Bush in the early 1990s.

Rudolph’s performance received acclaim from critics and comedians, including Harris herself.

“Maya Rudolph — I mean, she’s so good,” Harris said last month on ABC’s “The View.” “She had everything: a suit, jewelry, everything!”

Harris added that she was impressed by Rudolph’s “manners.”

Jason Miller, senior adviser to the former president and Republican candidate Donald Trumpexpressed surprise that Harris would appear on SNL, given what he characterized as her unflattering portrayal on the show. Asked if Trump had been invited to speak, he replied: “I don’t know. Probably not.”

However, politicians have a long history on SNL, including Trump, who hosted the show in 2015, although appearing so close to Election Day is unusual.

Hillary Clinton was running in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary when she appeared alongside Amy Poehler, who played her on the show and was known for her signature exaggerated cackle. The real Clinton wondered during her appearance, “Am I really laughing like that?”

Clinton returned in 2016, running in a race against Trump that she ultimately lost.

The first sitting president to appear on SNL was Republican Gerald Ford, who did so less than a year after the show debuted. Ford appeared in an April 1976 episode hosted by his press secretary, Ron Nessen, and announced the show’s famous opening line: “Live from New York, it’s Saturday night.”

Then-Illinois Sen. Barack Obama appeared alongside Poehler while impersonating Clinton in 2007, and Republican Bob Dole was on the show in November 1996—just 11 days after losing that year’s election to Bill Clinton. Dole consoled Norm MacDonald, who played the Kansas senator.

Then there was Tina Fey’s impression of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in 2008—and, in particular, her joke about “I can see Russia from my house.” It was so good that Fey eventually won an Emmy, and Palin herself appeared on the show in October of that year, a few weeks before the election.

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Long, Miller and Weissert reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Jill Colvin contributed to this report.