South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem's recent revelation that she fatally shot her family's "untrainable" puppy sparked a killer "Saturday Night Live" mock interview with the dead dog's purported replacement.
During the show's "Weekend Update" segment Saturday, co-host Colin Jost introduced cast member Marcello Hernández — wearing makeup, a furry brown costume with floppy ears and an orange collar — as "Kristi Noem's other dog."
Hernández identified himself as "Cricket" — the same name given to the 14-month-old wirehaired pointer that Noem acknowledged shooting in a gravel pit after it killed a family's chickens and bit her after a hunting trip.
"Wait, so your name is also Cricket?" Jost asked.
"My name is actually Cricket VII," Hernández said with a nervous smile.
"Yeah, the first six were bad dogs, Colin. But you know what they say? Lucky No. 7, right?"
Hernández also called Noem a "great owner" who "gives me so many toys," including "one of those dog-button mats that you can press to talk."
But he then tapped out messages that said: "She is going to kill me" and "I die tonight."
When Jost tried to console him, Hernández began panicked barking, but added: "But my point is, she's the best."
It's "like they say: I don't know if she rescued me — or if I'm gonna get shot in the face," he said.
At one point, Jost asked why Noem, a potential November running mate for former President Donald Trump, revealed what she did in her new memoir, "No Going Back: The Truth on What's Wrong with Politics and How We Move America Forward."
Hernández tapped out more messages that said, "She thought Trump would like it" and "She's not invited to Mar-a-Lago."
He then stage-whispered, "You know, she's writing another book. She keeps saying, 'You better behave or you're gonna go in the book.'"
Noem, 42, came under fire from dog lovers and some former Trump aides who expressed horror and shock that she would publicly admit having killed a pet.
In her memoir, Noem — who also wrote about killing a "mean" and smelly goat — said shooting Cricket "had to be done" and showed how she was able to do things that are "difficult, ugly and messy."
She repeated that message in an April 26 post on X.
"We love animals, but 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 wrote.
