'SNL' tackles Nunes memo and Fox and Friends in cold open

Justin Kirkland | Special for USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Natalie Portman returns to rapping on 'SNL' Over a decade later, Natalie Portman returned to 'Saturday Night Live' to deliver a follow-up to her 2006 rap debut. Alec Baldwin also came back as Donald Trump.

Nothing like starting off a morning, or Saturday night, with Fox and Friends.

For the first time in this post-Bobby Moynihan era, Fox and Friends returned to the Saturday Night Live cold open to break the news on the unsuccessful Nunes Memo.

As USA TODAY reported earlier this week, most of the allegations in the Nunes memo had already been aired, and others were quickly discredited as misleading or undercut by other information that was excluded from the memo.

Indeed, to the extent the document contained any surprises, it was the degree to which it actually undermined the attacks that the president and his allies had been advancing.

The Fox and Friends trio is joined by a number of special guests, including Hope Hicks (Cecily Strong) and Minister Louis Farrakhan (Chris Redd). While the camera glitched during Strong’s cameo, Twitter users’ most polarizing opinion came from Redd’s Farrakhan’s impression.

We've got White House communications director Hope Hicks on the line. #SNL pic.twitter.com/yhQaYju7gP — Saturday Night Live - SNL (@nbcsnl) February 4, 2018

Of course, the real special guest that the Fox and Friends hosts foam at the mouth over is Donald Trump, a la Alec Baldwin. Reporting live from his bed with a Diet Coke in hand, he makes good on all the weird stuff that happened this week.

In the wake of the Nunes Memo making the opposite waves that the GOP and the White House anticipated, Baldwin’s Trump focused on the week’s other events, including praise from “super popular” Senator Orrin Hatch and his State of the Union, which he said, “was better than Martin Luther King’s I Dream of Jeannie speech.”

Just one more question from President Trump. #SNL pic.twitter.com/N1flm8DC2x — Saturday Night Live - SNL (@nbcsnl) February 4, 2018

The Nunes Memo might have been a dud and Fox and Friends might be fueling a nation’s terror, but it’s always good to see SNL tackle the insanity.

Last week's 'SNL': Host Will Ferrell returned as George W. Bush for 'SNL' cold open