Saturday Night Live mocked former President Donald Trump's $399 gold sneakers.
Host Shane Gillis starred in the trailer for a parody of the 1992 sports comedy White Men Can't Jump called White Men Can Trump—billed as a "magical sneaker movie for white people."
It shows Gillis' character Gordon Dwyer down on his luck until he is gifted a pair of "Never Surrender High-Tops" from Trump.
But rather than improve his basketball skills, the sneakers only make Gillis' character good at making people think he's good at the sport.
"They give me the power to say I'm good at basketball, then double down on that until people actually start to believe it," Dwyer said, hinting at Trump's baseless claims about the 2020 election being stolen from him.
The trailer goes on to show him getting what he wants, including by persuading his boss that he needs his office instead of a cubicle and convincing a woman that he impressed her in bed—and also begin to resemble Trump's appearance and mannerisms.
Later, James Austin Johnson appears as Trump and tells Dwyer that "the real magic has been inside of you all along."
"Wrong," Dwyer tells him. "It comes from the shoes and you're coming off as very stupid and frankly quite rude walking in there like this."
Trump, who is seeking to reclaim the White House while facing four criminal prosecutions, announced the limited-edition gold sneakers at Sneaker Con a day after a judge ordered him to pay $355 million in fines, plus interest, finding he lied for years about his wealth on financial statements he used to secure loans and make deals.
In January, he was ordered to pay an additional $83.3 million to the writer E. Jean Carroll for defaming her, adding to a $5 million sexual assault and defamation verdict last year from another jury in a case brought by Carroll.
The sneakers—shiny gold high tops with an American flag detail on the back—have since sold out on a new website that also sells other Trump-branded shoes, cologne and perfume, and are being resold for thousands of dollars.
They are described on the website as "a true collector's item" with only 1,000 pairs made.
"Bold, gold, and tough, just like President Trump. They're for the go-getters who don't know the word quit," the description on the website says. "The Never Surrender sneakers are your rally cry in shoe form. Lace-up and step out ready to conquer."
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Khaleda Rahman is Newsweek's Senior News Reporter based in London, UK. Her focus is reporting on abortion rights, race, education, ... Read more
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