XPost: seattle.politics, talk.politics.guns, alt.law-enforcement
XPost: ca.politics, or.politics

Yet another example of government over reach.
They euthanized the pet squirrel and racoon.

NY officials seize P’Nut the squirrel from owner, sparking online
petition and donations
3 days ago
By Giulia Heyward

After 7 Years, P’Nut the Squirrel Is Taken Away and Euthanized
40 minutes ago
By Jesus Jimenez & Victor Mather

P'nut the squirrel's heartbroken owner breaks down over almond in his
pocket: 'Just a little reminder'
4 hours ago
Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF)

Government kills pet squirrel P’Nut in Fourth Amendment horror story
12 hours ago
By Daniel Woislaw

R.I.P’nut
8 hours ago
By Luther Ray Abel

WETM - MyTwinTiers.com
NY Assemblyman introduces ‘Peanut’s Law’ to safeguard sanctuary animals from undue harm
3 hours ago
By Brandon Kyc

P’nut The Squirrel memes follow his untimely death
3 hours ago
By Lindsey Weedston

try https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/peanut-the-squirrel-trump-maga-backlash-1235152260/

Here’s Why Trump’s Campaign Is Posting About a Dead Squirrel
Peanut the Squirrel was a mainstay on social media — and his
euthanization sparked a backlash

By Elisabeth Garber-Paul

November 4, 2024
mark longo peanut the squirrel
Mark Longo and Peanut the Squirrel.
Mark Longo/Instagram
It’s tough to think that a squirrel might tilt the presidential
election, but it’s 2024, so here we are.

It all started last week, when an Instagram-famous rodent named Peanut
was taken from a house near Elmira, New York, along with a raccoon named
Fred. Peanut had lived with Mark Longo and his wife, Daniela, for the
past seven years; Fred had lived there for about five months. Rescuing
Peanut from near-death and bonding with him had inspired the couple to
start a nonprofit animal sanctuary — P’Nut Freedom Farm — and Fred had been left at their doorstep.

But then, on Oct. 30, the New York Department of Environmental
Conservation (DEC) raided their home, and after a five-hour search, the
two animals were confiscated. According to a statement given to WENY, a
local TV station, by the DEC and the county health department, Peanut
had bitten one of the investigators, and both animals had to be
euthanized in order to test for rabies.

In a more reasonable timeline, the animals’ caretakers and fans would
mourn them, and perhaps it would spark internet discourse on the ethics
of keeping wild animals indoors, effectively as pets. (All the other
animals in their care live outside.) But like a 2024 Murphy’s law, if something ends up trending, it must become political.

So when Longo posted about his anger with the DEC for using tax dollars
to raid his nonprofit sanctuary, it got picked up by local Republican politicians blaming Gov. Kathy Hochul. Then Elon Musk, the world
richest’s man, got involved, meming the squirrel to oblivion while his minions began cranking out AI sludge of former President Donald Trump
and Peanut standing triumphantly, together. Trump’s campaign posted on TikTok: “Vote Trump for Peanut.” His account wrote that Peanut was “needlessly murdered by Democrat bureaucrats in New York,” adding: “We will avenge you on Tuesday at the ballot box.”

By Sunday, the squirrel was on the cover of the New York Post.

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Longo tells Rolling Stone that he is surprised that, in such a fraught
week in American history, anyone cares this much about his squirrel, but
he does appreciate the outpouring of support. “The fact that my squirrel
made national world history [in] the last week is nothing short of incredible,” he tells Rolling Stone. “But that’s not what I wanted from this. I wanted my animal.”

Who is Peanut and how did he become a famous squirrel?
About seven years ago, Mark Longo, then living in Connecticut and
working in New York, was leaving a job in the city and saw a squirrel
get hit by a car. When he went to scare its baby back onto the sidewalk,
the squirrel ran up his leg instead. With only one eye open and a bad
limp, Longo started to call local vets. “They all said they would
probably just euthanize him,” he told the YouTube channel The Koala in
2022. “So I started researching squirrels.” After eight-months of DIY rehab, he said, he released Peanut into his backyard, but the squirrel
was quickly attacked by another animal, losing half his tail in the
process. “That was pretty much the end of Peanut’s wildlife career,” he said. It did, though, spark his interest in rescuing animals. He
launched an Instagram page for his pet, fired up a career as an OnlyFans
model (yes, his handle there is Squirrel Daddy), and in a few years, had
enough money for him and his wife to ditch city life for Western New York.

Most of the animals they took in — horses, alpacas — don’t require licensing. But it wasn’t legal for the star of the operation, Peanut, as
a potential rabies vector, to live long-term indoors. About six months
ago, after Peanut’s star began to rise, anonymous complaints flooded
into the Department of Environmental Conservation. He got a call warning
him to get right with the state, and he started the process of
registering Peanut as an educational animal. “Me and my wife went and
took the wildlife [rehabilitator] license [test],” he says. “We were in
the process of getting paperwork filed. We were doing our due
diligence.” He says they had occasional visits from local wildlife
services but that they never found any issues at the farm. “Animal
Control became an acquaintance,” he says. “They were getting so many
calls and complaints, and they would come up here and say, everything is
good. All the animals up here are fine.”

When did Fred the raccoon get involved?
According to Longo, Fred was left at the shelter’s doorstep a month or
two after that initial call from the DEC. He says that he and his wife
were so taken by the animal that they, admittedly, didn’t look into additional licensing to keep it. “He had like 60 ticks that we plucked off,” he says. “We cleaned him up, we got him prepped, and he was going
to return to the wild as soon as he got big enough.” Fred quickly became
one of the stars of their social media channels.

What happened with the raid?
While the DEC did not respond to Rolling Stone’s request for comment,
Longo claims that it was an organized effort by internet trolls to
overwhelm the agency with anonymous complaints that brought the raid. As
he has tearfully recounted many times over the past days, after a judge
signed off on a search warrant, six DEC officers as well as a handful of
other law enforcement arrived at his home demanding the squirrel and the raccoon.

“My wife immediately told the police officers where Fred was,” he says. “We did try to keep Peanut away, to see if I could talk them off a
ledge.” The investigation lasted five hours, he says, which meant that
his rescue horses missed multiple meals and necessary care because he couldn’t tend to them. “These are animals that have been starved,” he says. “And now you’re starving them yourself.”

Since the raid, Longo has been quick to criticize the Department of Environmental Conservation — a statewide agency run out of Albany — for
its handling of their case. He says he’s had plenty of interactions with local wildlife authorities, and that they found no issues with the farm.

Then things got political?
“I’m the first one to say that I shy away from politics, but it sparks
me in the sense of, ‘This is how the government is run in New York State?’” he tells Rolling Stone. “I don’t want Peanut’s name to die in
vain.”

Keeping a raccoon — an animal that is known to carry rabies — in their house without appropriate licensing was illegal, but they have retained
a lawyer and plan to pursue legal action, though Longo declines to
comment specifically on what that will be.

Some Republicans have used this as an opportunity to take legal steps;
over the weekend, New York State Assmeblymember Jake Blumencranz
announced on X that he’d be introducing the “Peanut’s Law: Humane Animal Protections Act.” But overwhelmingly, the response from the right was
simply to spin Democrats as the party of such rampant government
overreach that it kills helpless animals, and Trump as the only one who
can save the country. “Are these the same guys that killed my whale and
my bear? And, what happened to the head?” Robert F. Kennedy Jr. joked on
X, referring to the confusing animal-related scandals that plagued his
campaign this summer. “Just asking for a friend.”

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