NEW YORK – Vice President Kamala Harris made an unannounced trip to New York to appear on “Saturday Night Live,” briefly stepping away from key states where she has been campaigning with just three days until the election.

Harris departed on Air Force Two after a campaign stop Saturday in Charlotte, North Carolina. He was scheduled to head to Detroit, but once the plane was in the air, his aides said he was actually headed to New York.

Her appearance on the show was confirmed by three people familiar with Harris’ plans who were not authorized to speak publicly about them. It’s the last episode of SNL before Election Day on Tuesday.

Actress Maya Rudolph first played Harris on the show in 2019 and reprized her role this season, doing a perfect impression of the vice president, even calling herself “Momala.”

Rudolph opened the show’s season premiere with the line, “Well, well, well. Look who fell out of that coconut tree.” And he has joked about keeping President Joe Biden in his place.

Harris’ husband, Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, has been played by former cast member Andy Samberg and Biden is played by Dana Carvey, who also played then-President George HW Bush in the early 1990s.

Rudolph’s performance has earned critical and comedic praise, including from Harris herself.

“Maya Rudolph… I mean, she’s so good,” Harris said last month on ABC’s “The View.” “She had everything, the suit, the jewelry, everything!”

Harris added that she was impressed with Rudolph’s “mannerisms.”

Politicians have a long history on SNL, including Harris’ Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump, who hosted the show in 2015.

Hillary Clinton was running for president in the 2008 Democratic primary when she appeared alongside Amy Poehler, who played her on the show and offered a trademark, exaggerated laugh. The real Clinton asked herself during her appearance: “Do I really laugh like that?”

Clinton returned in 2016, while running against Trump in a race she ultimately lost.

The first sitting president to appear on Saturday Night Live was Republican Gerald Ford, who did so less than a year after the show’s debut. Ford appeared on April 17, 1976, and declared the show’s famous opening, “Live from New York.”

Barack Obama was still only a Democratic presidential candidate when he emerged in February 2008, and Republican Bob Dole made his appearance in 1996, just 11 days after losing that year’s election to Democrat Bill Clinton. Dole comforted Norm Macdonald, who played the Kansas senator on the show.

Then there was Tina Fey’s 2008 impression of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, and in particular her joke that “I can see Russia from my house.” It was so good that Fey won an Emmy Award. Palin herself appeared on the show that season, in the weeks leading up to the election.