In the last couple of weeks, we’ve seen Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton crank up their campaign in New York. The primary is on Tuesday, and the state’s 247 pledged delegates are at stake. So we’ve seen things like Clinton use the subway and Sanders eat a hot dog in order to prove to New Yorkers that they’re the candidate worth voting for. There was also a debate in Brooklyn this week, which was a bit saltier than the past debates between the two.
SNL reunited Larry David and Julia Louis-Dreyfus for New York City’s Democratic debate
Alex Abad-Santos is a senior correspondent who explains what society obsesses over, from Marvel and movies to fitness and skin care. He came to Vox in 2014. Prior to that, he worked at The Atlantic.
To honor Sanders and Clinton’s New York push, Saturday Night Live used the debate as its cold open. Kate McKinnon’s Hillary Clinton squared off against Larry David’s Bernie Sanders. The topics included the overall tone of the campaign, the 1994 crime bill, and New York’s recent minimum wage increase.
“Wolf, I have said from the beginning it should be a combination of 12 and/or 15,” McKinnon’s Clinton says.
That eventually ends with Clinton taking Sanders in a headlock and asking him if he “feels the Bern.”
The skit meanders a bit at times, and there are some off jokes in there, including one about Sanders marching in Selma with Martin Luther but running away from the hoses because he didn’t want to get wet.
But one of the best parts of the “debate” was when it allowed questions from “real New Yorkers.” These real New Yorkers were actually television characters from sitcoms that take place in New York City. Enter Julia Louis-Dreyfus reprising her Seinfeld character Elaine Benes. It allowed for a Seinfeldian moment and reunion between David and Louis-Dreyfus.
“You’ve been pretty vague in the past. But how exactly are you going break up the big banks?” Benes asked.
“You mean a Big Bank Breakup?” Sanders replies.
“Yeah, a Big Bank Breakup!” Benes replies.
Even though we had Kate McKinnon’s Clinton, David’s Sanders, and Louis-Dreyfus’s Elaine playing flashy roles in this skit, it was actually Vanessa Bayer’s Rachel Green (of Friends) impression and a Cliff Huxtable-Bill Cosby joke that made it. The latter was introduced as a “a father of six” and “OB-GYN from Brooklyn.”
“I need black voters, but not that badly.” David’s Sanders says, before the show starts to segue into its opening credits.
