I am sure she thought that this revelation would bring her closer to the rest of her MAGA friends and put her in the driver's seat to be Donald Trump's VP pick, but it backfired. She has been living in a MAGA bubble where being cruel to poor and underrepresented people was fashionable, so she thought that this mentality would translate to animals as well.
Sadly for her, and her political career, her calculation was way off. She forgot how much American's love their pets, especially their dogs. (I could have told her. I wrote about this very thing years ago.) Now, Americans are united in their outrage at her actions. I mean seriously, who murders a puppy?! She tried to rationalize away her actions by saying that she lived on a farm, and that farmers have to make tough choices between life and death when it comes to their animals. But no one is buying it. We are talking about a puppy for crying out loud. The thing is, the man she has been auditioning for would have probably done the same thing. Cruelty to animals is a known trait of sociopaths. Donald Trump hates dogs, and Kristi Noem knows that. This little blurb from her book was to him and the rest of the MAGA base. These folks, after all, believe that cruelty is sexy. The cruelty is the point with them.
This, though, was a bridge too far. And Noem knows it. Her political career is over. If Trump wins he might reward her with a position in his cabinet, but that's the best she can hope for.
Americans will forgive her cheating on her husband with a known scumbag, but not killing a puppy.
RIP Cricket.