Nov 17, 2019

"SNL" cold open reimagines impeachment hearings as a soap opera

Rebecca Falconer

A screenshot of Jon Hamm as Bill Taylor and Kate McKinnon as Rudy Giuliani on "Saturday Night Live." Photo: "SNL"/NBC

"Saturday Night Live" parodied the Trump impeachment hearings as a "Days of Our Lives"-inspired reimagination — dubbed the "Days of Our Impeachment" — in its latest cold open, with Jon Hamm starring as diplomat Bill Taylor.

The big picture: Other highlights included Cecily Strong as Marie Yovanovitch, the former Ukraine ambassador targeted by President Trump's tweets as she testified Friday. And Kate McKinnon was back as Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, declaring: "Mercury’s in retrograde, so my powers are at an all-time high."

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Rashaan Ayesh, Shane Savitsky

All the people Trump says he doesn't know in the Ukraine investigation

Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

In a tweet Sunday, President Trump attacked Jennifer Williams, an aide to Vice President Mike Pence, for her testimony in a closed-door impeachment hearing, calling her a "Never Trumper" while also claiming he doesn't know who she is.

The big picture: Over the past few weeks, the president has continually claimed that he does not know several of the key people involved in the impeachment inquiry — despite them serving in his own administration.

Go deeperArrowUpdated Nov 17, 2019
Axios

Highlights from Laura Cooper's and David Hale's impeachment testimonies

Photo: Erin Schaff/Pool/Getty Images

Defense Department official Laura Cooper and Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale testified Wednesday in the second impeachment hearing of the day.

Driving the news: Cooper testified that, after the transcript of her closed-door deposition was released on Nov. 11, members of her staff brought her two unclassified emails from the State Department revealing that the Ukrainian Embassy was inquiring about the military aid on July 25 — the same day as Trump's phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Go deeperArrowUpdated Nov 21, 2019
Axios

The highlights from all of the public impeachment hearings

The view before Marie Yovanovitch's impeachment hearing. Photo: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

The House Intelligence Committee wrapped up on Thursday its planned schedule of public testimony in its impeachment inquiry, holding seven hearings with 12 witnesses over the past two weeks.

The big picture: The committee heard hours of testimony from witnesses who were both working on the ground in Ukraine and within the Trump administration at the time of the alleged White House pressure campaign against the Ukrainian government to secure an investigation into the Biden family's business dealings.

Go deeperArrowUpdated Nov 22, 2019