Kristi Noem Shooting Her Dog in Cold Blood Was 'One of the Reasons' Donald Trump Chose Her to Lead Homeland Security, Book Claims

An explosive new book claims President Donald Trump was poised to tap Kristi Noem as his vice presidential running mate until backlash over her admission that she fatally shot her dog led him to instead choose J.D. Vance — and that he ultimately viewed the controversy as an "asset" in selecting her to lead the Department of Homeland Security.

In her forthcoming book Undue Process: The Inside Story of Trump’s Mass Deportation Program, NBC News reporter Julia Ainsley writes that Noem was removed from the vice presidential short list after the release of her memoir in May 2024, in which she described killing her puppy.

Ainsley’s book, excerpts of which have been published by The Atlantic, says many believed the backlash over the shooting would destroy any of Noem’s chances of joining the Trump administration. That, however, was not how events played out.

“Trump actually saw this particular biographical detail as an asset in his Homeland Security Secretary — it was one of the reasons he chose her,” according to the magazine’s review of Ainsley’s book.

The then-South Dakota governor confirmed in her May 2024 memoir, No Going Back, that she shot and killed her 14-month-old puppy, Cricket, approximately 20 years ago.

Noem described the female German Wirehaired Pointer as "untrainable," "dangerous” and "less than worthless" as a hunting dog.

Noem wrote that Cricket reportedly went "out of her mind with excitement" during a pheasant hunt, chasing birds and ignoring commands.

On the way home from the hunt, the dog escaped and killed several of a neighbor's chickens.

The DHS secretary stated that when she tried to intervene, the dog "whipped around to bite" her, provoking her to lead Cricket to a gravel pit where she shot her, stating, "I hated that dog."

On the same day, Noem said she also shot a "nasty and mean" male goat that had been chasing her children.

The dog-shooting incident has been the subject of scorn and parody, most recently in an episode of South Park, in which a cartoon-Noem went on a shooting rampage in a pet store.

“The dog was actively killing animals for fun, had been massacring chickens and then had tried to bite me and attack me,” Noem told MAGA-friendly podcaster Miranda Devine.

“That is something that happens from time to time, and keeping children and people safe is incredibly important," she said.

She said she included the dog-shooting incident in her book in order to be transparent about making “hard decisions" and acknowledged that it had been used against her publicly until the president reportedly saw it as an asset.

“I absolutely love animals, I’ve always had dogs, I still have a dog that goes everywhere with me, and that situation there was hard,” Noem shared.