“Has anybody else worn blackface in college? Anybody?”
That was Saturday Night Live (SNL) actor Kenan Thompson, playing a Virginia politician, trying to help fellow lawmakers understand why it was wrong for them to wear blackface when they were younger in a sketch that aired this weekend.
None appeared to capture what he’s trying to tell them.
WATCH: ‘I’m not going anywhere’ — Virginia governor resists calls to step down over racist photo
The sketch came amid an ongoing controversy in Virginia, where Gov. Ralph Northam has refused to step down after a 1984 medical school yearbook photo emerged showing one person in blackface and another dressed like a member of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).
The photo appeared next to Northam’s entry.
“Virginia needs someone that can heal,” Northam said on CBS’ Face the Nation Sunday.
READ MORE: ‘I’m not going anywhere’ — Virginia governor resists calls to step down over racist photo
Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring subsequently admitted that he wore blackface at a college party in 1980.
The state’s Lt. Gov. Anthony Fairfax also became the subject of allegations of sexual assault, but he too refused to resign.
Should Northam, Herring and Fairfax resign, then Republican Speaker of the House of Delegates Kirk Cox would take the governor’s job.
WATCH: Feb. 9 — Democrats call on Virginia’s Fairfax to resign after second accuser comes forward
In the SNL sketch, Thompson asks a group of white politicians whether they had worn blackface in the past.
One sheepishly admits to having done so, then others use the excuse that it was the 1980s.
All the responses frustrate Thompson’s character, who muses, “Am I in Hell?”
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