Kristi Noem calls reports of her killing family dog ‘fake news’: ‘It was not a puppy’

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem who recently revealed that she killed her 14-month-old dog has now claimed that reports of the story were “fake news.” However, she also said that the dog, Cricket, was “extremely dangerous” and deserved what happened.

Kristi Noem calls reports of her killing her family dog ‘fake news’ (AP Photo/Jack Dura, File)(AP)

“You know how the fake news works,” Noem told Fox News. “They leave out some or most of the facts of a story, they put the worst spin on it. And that’s what’s happened in this case.”

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“I hope people really do buy this book and they find out the truth of the story because the truth of the story is that this was a working dog and it was not a puppy. It was a dog that was extremely dangerous,” she added.

Noem confessed to killing Cricket, a “less than worthless” wirehair pointer dog she said she “hated.” The revealed the details in her upcoming book – No Going Back – excerpts of which were published by The Guardian. Noem also said in her book that Cricket had an “aggressive personality” and was “untrainable.” She even admitted that she killed a “nasty and mean” male goat, describing it as “disgusting” and “rancid.”

‘It was a hard decision’

Noem did not mention the goat during her conversation with Fox News. She said of the dog, “It had come to us from a family who had found her way too aggressive. We were her second chance and the day she was put down was a day that she massacred livestock that were part of our neighbours. She attacked me and it was a hard decision.”

Sean Hannity, the show’s host, compared Noem’s decision to shoot Cricket with the case of Commander – Joe Biden’s German Shepherd. After Commander was involved in cases of biting, he was sent away from the White House, but not killed.

“You say here you said you follow the law in your book. What is the law?” Hannity asked.

“Virtually every state has a law in place that says the animals that attack and kill livestock can be put down in situations like this,” Noem replied.

The Guardian reviewed South Dakota state law and found that by failing to control the dog when it killed a neighbour’s chickens, and also by killing the dog on her property, Noem may have committed a misdemeanour.

“Farmers and ranchers, they expect it. They know that once an animal like this starts killing and starts killing just because they enjoy it, that is a very dangerous animal. And that was the situation that we were dealing with,” Noem said. “And I’m a dog lover. I’ve trained dogs for years, I’ve been around hundreds of them, of course. And so this was a tough situation and very difficult. But that’s what happens in rural America many times.”

She also said, “I hope people do read the facts of the story [about Cricket and the goat] and truly understand that I’m a mom, and at the time I had small children and a lot of small kiddos that worked around our business and people and I wanted to make sure that they were safe and that dogs that have this kind of a problem that have been to training for months and still kill for fun, they are extremely dangerous and a responsible owner does what they need to do and what the law will allow.”