Hello, boys and girls!
Ho! Ho! Ho! It’s me, Jolly Ole Saint Nick! Except these days Santa’s not so jolly—and you won’t be either, once you read this letter.
Boys and girls, Christmas isn’t looking too good this year. Many of you are going to find fewer toys than usual under the tree on Christmas morning, and some unlucky boys and girls aren’t going to find any toys at all!
Why, you ask? Let Santa explain.
First there are the tariffs, which is just a grown-up word for taxes. Tariffs have caused the prices for toys made in Santa’s offshore workshops in China, Malaysia, Mexico, and Vietnam to skyrocket. Santa’s accountants warned him that his bottom line was redder than Rudolph’s nose!
Things got so bad that Santa had to DOGE half of his workshop staff. True, most of the elves were going to be declared redundant over the next few years anyway, thanks to A.I., but it was still tough to say good-bye to the little fellas, especially since, with their age and particular job skills, they’ll probably never find work again.
Luckily, Mrs. Claus was able to find new employment, Instacarting at the North Pole’s Safeway. But she’s still not speaking to Santa.
A bigger problem is safety. Because of a shortage of air-traffic controllers, piloting a flying sled has suddenly become very, very dangerous. Santa’s reindeer are deathly afraid of having a midair collision with a Boeing 737 or FedEx cargo plane. Instead of presents, you could wake up Christmas morning to find sleigh-bell shards and pieces of Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, and Vixen on your front lawn!
Then there is Santa’s personal safety. As everyone knows, Santa lives up at the North Pole. So when he enters the U.S. to deliver toys, technically he’s a non-citizen. This has never been a problem—until now!
Recently, heavily armed, masked men have been roaming city streets looking for undocumented immigrants, and they aren’t very nice to them when they find them. They might even tear-gas poor ole Santa and disappear him to some horrible detention facility in El Salvador. Boys and girls, you don’t want to know what happens to a rosy-cheeked, twinkly-eyed man like Santa in prison!
Lastly, Santa has some especially sad news for boys and girls living in Venezuela. There is no way Santa is going to risk being targeted as a drug smuggler by the Department of War and mistakenly being blown to smithereens. Santa has seen the footage. Their policy seems to be shoot first and ask questions later, or not at all. If Santa goes to Venezuela, you might as well just hold a mistletoe over his head and kiss his butt good-bye.
So, boys and girls, Christmas is looking to be a real bummer this year. And, if Santa is being totally honest, Christmas 2026, 2027, and 2028 aren’t looking so hot, either.
Santa knows the situation seems hopeless, and many of you will be tempted to just say “Screw it” and start acting more naughty than nice. This will make Santa very sad, but he will certainly understand.
Ho! Ho! Ah, forget it.
Santa
John Ficarra is a former editor of Mad magazine
