Shane Gillis claims he turned down ‘SNL’ offer to play Trump this season

Many people are saying it, they’re calling it the worst deal in “Saturday Night Live” history. 

Comedian Shane Gillis claimed that the sketch comedy institution invited him to portray Donald Trump on the show this season, and he turned the offer down. Gold Derby has reached out to NBC for comment or confirmation. 

During an appearance at the Skankfest comedy festival last weekend, comedian Luis J. Gomez said that Gillis attended the festival instead of doing “SNL.” 

In video footage of the live event shared by X user Zeebz989 (via The Daily Beast), Gomez introduces Gillis, who is in the audience, by saying that “nobody thought he was coming to the festival this year.

“Explain why,” Gillis says.

“Because he was offered to play Trump on the entire season of ‘SNL’ and he turned it down to f—ing be here, folks!”

Gillis confirms Gomez’s story, adding “They said, ‘Are you serious? You’re going to say no?’ I said, ‘Lorne, I gotta go to Coke Magic,’” a show where Gomez performs magic tricks. 

It’s a dramatic new development in the saga of Shane Gillis and “Saturday Night Live.” The show hired Gillis in 2019 as a featured player and quickly fired him before he ever appeared due to racist jokes Gillis had made on a podcast. In the years after that incident, Gillis’ profile rose due, in part, to his Donald Trump impression. Gillis was invited back to “Saturday Night Live” as a host earlier this year, where he appeared in a sketch as Trump. Then “Saturday Night Live” showrunner Lorne Michaels stoked speculation that Gillis would return to do his Trump impression in Season 50 when he told The Hollywood Reporter that Trump would be “reinvented” this season and intimated that impression specialist cast member James Austin Johnson would not reprise the role. But then the show premiered on September 29, revealing Johnson was Trump once more. Now we know why. 

During Trump’s 2016 campaign and presidency, Alec Baldwin portrayed him on “SNL” until Johnson took over in Season 47. This season’s recurring special guests playing political figures during election season include Maya Rudolph as Kamala Harris, Jim Gaffigan as Tim Walz, Andy Samberg as Doug Emhoff, and cast member Bowen Yang as JD Vance, with Dana Carvey appearing as Joe Biden in the premiere.