SNL's shirtless Vladimir Putin brings Donald Trump an Elf on the Shelf


The incessantly shirtless Russian President Vladimir Putin (Beck Bennett) came down the chimney to visit Alec Baldwin's Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live — he was "just in town, you know, hiding in the walls" — and he brought along a little Christmas gift. "This is Elf on the Shelf — it's fun!" Putin says, revealing an elf with one eye that's definitely a camera lens. "You just put it right here, next to your internet router. You keep it there all year. It's fun, yes?"
While Melania Trump (Cecily Strong) is suspicious of Putin's intentions, Trump keeps the party going with the arrival of his secretary of state nominee, ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson (a guest appearance by John Goodman), who seems to have the buddy-buddy relationship with the Russian president, of which Trump can only dream. Watch the full skit below. Bonnie Kristian
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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