Animal rights nonprofit group PETA has strongly condemned Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) after she recently shared a story about her killing her 14-month-old dog, “Cricket,” for his lousy hunting skills.
The story is published in her book No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong with Politics and How We Move America Forward and was intended to show that when it came to politics or personal life, she wasn’t afraid of getting “messy and ugly.” It instead garnered sharp criticism from animal lovers everywhere.
“Most Americans love their dogs, and we suspect that they will consider Gov. Noem a psychotic loony for letting this rambunctious puppy loose on chickens and then punishing her by deciding to personally blow her brains out rather than attempting to train her or find a more responsible guardian who would provide her with a proper home,” PETA Senior Director Colleen O’Brien said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “Gov. Noem obviously fails to understand the vital political concepts of education, cooperation, compromise, and compassion.
Noem decided to shoot Cricket after the dog killed a local family’s chickens after a pheasant hunting trip and then bit her when she tried to intervene. Noem said she “hated that dog” and deemed it “less than worthless” for being unable to hunt properly.
After taking the dog to a gravel pit and shooting it, she also shot a goat she owned, which she said stunk and was “nasty and mean.”
Later on, her daughter arrived home and asked where Cricket was.
“Kennedy looked around confused,” Noem writes of her daughter, who asked, “Hey, where’s Cricket?”
Noem admitted if she “were a better politician I wouldn’t tell the story here.”
In response to the criticism of her callous actions, Noem took to X to affirm her love for animals while also promoting her book.
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“Tough decisions like this happen all the time on a farm. Sadly, we just had to put down 3 horses a few weeks ago that had been in our family for 25 years,” she said.
Noem is a vice presidential contender for former President Donald Trump. In response to the Washington Examiner’s request for comment, her staff directed the Washington Examiner to her post on X.
