With today’s headlines sounding more like wild movie plots, Saturday Night Live has no shortage of absurdity to mine for laughs. And on April 5, the late-night comedy show once again set its sights on a familiar target — Elon Musk.
Wearing a cheesehead hat and all, Mike Myers stepped in to impersonate the Tesla CEO in a sketch that left the internet buzzing.
The sketch unfolded during the “Trump Tariff Cold Open,” where James Austin Johnson’s Trump tried to calm America after the stock market took a nosedive following one of his latest tariff announcements. That’s when Myers, as Musk, entered the scene with a cheesehead on his head — a clear reference to Musk’s real-life appearance at a Wisconsin rally in support of a Trump-endorsed candidate, which ultimately flopped.
“That was from when I tried to buy the election in Wisconsin,” Myers’ Musk quipped. “I’m an idiot. I should have just bought Wisconsin!”
The sketch then introduced a fictional, satirical Tesla release — the Model-V, described as the world’s first self-vandalizing electric car, complete with self-smashing headlights, self-slashing tires, and AI-generated graffiti. A not-so-subtle jab at recent protests and incidents where Tesla vehicles have been deliberately damaged.
As expected, Elon wasn’t amused.
The billionaire entrepreneur, who hosted SNL back in 2021 but later distanced himself from the show, fired back on X (formerly Twitter):
“SNL hasn’t been funny in a long time. They are their own parody.”
Classic Elon — never one to let a jab go unanswered.
Fans quickly jumped to his defense, criticizing the show for what they viewed as a tasteless mockery of someone with Asperger’s — a condition Musk disclosed during his SNL hosting stint. One viewer slammed the sketch as “really poor,” adding, “Making fun of high-functioning Asperger’s is so typical of the mentally ill left.”
The account Autism Capital, known for its defense of Musk, posted:
“This is such exceedingly bad taste. Wow. Not ever funny, just mean. Born from hate, not from humor.”
Others, however, weren’t quite so sympathetic. Some took to social media to poke fun at Musk’s reaction, posting crying memes and taunting comments like, “Boo hoo crybaby.” One user even reminded him, “Didn’t you host a few years ago? You just don’t like that they made fun of you.”
As for Mike Myers, his appearance was a surprise — and possibly a sign he’s not done parodying powerful figures like Musk. Given the billionaire’s increasingly public role in politics, culture, and tech, it’s safe to say he’ll remain an SNL target for the foreseeable future.
And judging by Elon’s response, we can probably expect a few more late-night Twitter rants the next time his name gets dropped in a sketch.
Because let’s face it — what’s an SNL episode without a little Musk-induced drama?
