Kristi Noem under­es­ti­mates shock over dog killing, join­ing past politi­cians’ mis­steps with pets

Gov. Kristi Noem‘s (R‑SD) anec­dote about killing her dog, a sto­ry told in her most recent book, didn’t just lead to pub­lic out­rage — it’s like­ly to harm her chances of join­ing for­mer Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump‘s 2024 tick­et.
The South Dako­ta gov­er­nor dou­bled down on jus­ti­fy­ing the killing of 14-month-old pup­py Crick­et, whom she “hat­ed,” over the week­end after sig­nif­i­cant back­lash.
Accord­ing to excerpts from her book No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong with Pol­i­tics and How We Move Amer­i­ca For­ward, after Crick­et attacked a local family’s chick­ens dur­ing a pheas­ant hunt­ing trip, Noem led the dog to a grav­el pit and shot it.
The sto­ry led to wide­spread con­dem­na­tion from Democ­rats, Repub­li­cans, and ani­mal rights groups.
“Oppo­si­tion to ani­mal cru­el­ty and the treat­ment of dogs as fam­i­ly mem­bers are uni­ver­sal val­ues in our nation regard­less of polit­i­cal per­sua­sion or par­ty,” Wayne Pacelle, the pres­i­dent of Ani­mal Well­ness Action, told the Wash­ing­ton Exam­in­er. “And she vio­lat­ed the norms of our soci­ety when it comes to the care of our dogs.”
Pacelle also …