“I want people to know I’m honest,” Noem told Fox News’ Jesse Watters in defense of her dog slaying anecdote. Moments later she gave the world’s least believable excuse for deleting a passage from her book about “staring down” Kim Jong-un.

Yesterday, Politico reported that Noem tried to put the now-infamous anecdote about killing her dog in her first book. “Then, as now, Noem wanted the story in because it showed a decisive person who was unwilling to be bound by namby-pamby niceties, while others on the team — which included agents, editors and publicists at Hachette Book Group’s prestige Twelve imprint, and a ghostwriter — saw it as a bad-taste anecdote that would hurt her brand. The tale was ultimately cut, according to two people involved with the project,” Politico said.

Apparently, Gov. Kristi Noem thinks that it's just the liberal media elites who don’t understand how awesome it was for her to kill her 14-month-old dog. But even Fox News host Jesse Watters seemed to consider it a mistake to have put the anecdote in her second book. He all but asked Noem to walk it back during his softball interview with her last night.

After Noem made a plug for a role in a Trump presidency (“I’ve told him I’ll do whatever he wants me to do to help him win”), Watters asked the Trump VP-wannabe what she’d say to Vice President Kamala Harris if, during a VP debate, she says, “You shot your dog and you wrote a book about it, bragging about it. How can you be vice president?”

NOEM: You know, that story was a choice, as a mom, for the safety of my children versus a dangerous dog that was killing livestock and attacking people. So, I - this book that I've written is full of stories of my past hard decisions. And I told the truth, and I think that's very different than a lot of politicians that we have today.

WATTERS: Do you feel like oh, maybe I shouldn’t have said it? Do you understand why people don't like that story?

No, Noem does not seem to understand. She said, “Everybody has known that story for years” and that it’s been used to attack her for years. “I wanted people to know the truth,” Noem reiterated. “This dog was vicious. It was dangerous. It was killing livestock for the joy of it and attacking people. And I had a choice between keeping my family safe - I had little kids at the time, a very public business of inviting people out to come out and enjoy our hunting lodge in our business. And I don't pass my responsibilities off to anybody else. So that story’s in the book because I want people to know that I'm honest, and that I when I have difficult jobs, I take responsibility myself.”

“So, you're standing by the dog story,” Watters responded.

“Well, I'll tell you what, it's the facts,” Noem said.

Methinks Noem protested about telling the truth too much. Especially after her very bizarre comments about what was obviously a Kim Jong-un falsehood.

The New York Times, which got an advance copy of Noem’s book, quoted this excerpt:

“I remember when I met with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. I’m sure he underestimated me, having no clue about my experience staring down little tyrants (I’d been a children’s pastor, after all). Dealing with foreign leaders takes resolve, preparation, and determination.”

The Times reported that the anecdote about meeting Kim Jong-un has since been removed, along with “corrections” about a phone call with Nikki Haley. But when Watters asked Noem as to whether she had met the North Korean dictator, Noem claimed the passage about a meeting she had bragged about in her book was removed because “I don’t talk about my conversations with world leaders.”

Watters, doing his best to try to help Noem, said, “Maybe you did have a conversation here but you don’t want to tell.”

“I will not talk about my personal conversations with any world leaders,” Noem insisted again. “I just won’t.” 

Of course, Watters did not ask her why, then, she had just put her “encounter” in a book and had not decided to remove it until it was made public that the meeting had never happened. As The Washington Post noted, Noem's spokesperson had originally claimed she “conflated world leaders’ names in the book,” when the - uh, mistake was pointed out. Even though that explanation strains credulity, too, to put it mildly.

But rather than press her on this blatant lie, Watters let Noem pivot to “talking about what Americans care about,” such as “how do we get our country back and that’s what this book is about.”

Also not mentioned? The Daily Mail has reported that Noem – “who stresses her belief in ‘family values’” - has been “carrying on” an extramarital affair with Trump advisor Corey Lewandowski, also married, since 2019 “if not before.”

Instead, Watters said he had been excited to receive a cowboy hat from his “truthtelling” guest.

You can watch Noem’s BS below, from the May 6, 2024 Jesse Watters Primetime.