TAKE A BITE OUT OF CORRUPTION

Dear Attorney General Bondi,

This is McGruff the Crime Dog, writing with the quiet dignity of someone who just reviewed the DHS timeline and had to walk outside to bark at the sky for three consecutive minutes. I’ve seen corruption. I’ve smelled corruption. I’ve even stepped in corruption — barefoot — in Florida. But even I wasn’t prepared for the majestic speed at which Kristi Noem turned Homeland Security into her own personal Hollywood backlot. She was sworn in on January 25, and by February your department looked like it was being run by a caffeine-addicted Instagram influencer with a federal budget attached.

By the time she filmed her Mount Rushmore cowboy commercial on October 2 — during a government shutdown, no less — I genuinely thought I’d hallucinated the timeline. I kept asking myself if DHS had quietly rebranded as the Department of Homeland Showbiz, because I’m old enough to remember when “national emergency” meant hurricanes, not “Kristi wants dramatic lighting for her monologue.” Nothing says fiscal responsibility like spending millions on ads that give off the exact energy of a Jeep commercial filmed by someone who has never driven a Jeep.

I will avoid dwelling on the… “incident” involving the puppy. Dogs have honor codes. We don’t gossip about our fallen. But I will say this: when someone’s résumé includes “shot a puppy and then bragged about it in hardcover,” they probably shouldn’t be in charge of a department with access to armored vehicles. My tail goes stiff every time her name comes up. You ever seen a cartoon where a dog senses a ghost? It’s like that, except the ghost is ethics.

What truly pushes me to the brink of losing my trench-coated composure is the $220 million ad campaign funneled through a shell company so fresh they probably filed its paperwork while standing in line at the DMV. Turns out that behind this mystery LLC sits a Republican consulting firm run by — surprise! — the husband of Noem’s own spokesperson. You can practically hear the procurement regulations sobbing in the background. I’ve sniffed drug labs with cleaner chains of custody.

I want you to know I’m not looking for revenge. I’m a professional. My job is justice, not jumping on a Cabinet secretary and shaking her like a squeaky toy. I am restraining myself. I am composed. I am civilized. But I will state for the record that if Secretary Noem were to attempt any sudden movements in my direction, I would invoke the sacred doctrine of “self-defense,” and I would not be the one limping away. I’m too old, too seasoned, and too union-protected to die in a scuffle with a woman who once shot a goat over a bad attitude.

But none of this can proceed without your authorization, Pam. You’re the top law enforcement officer in the country — on paper, anyway — and someone has to decide whether the Crime Dog gets unleashed or whether I’m supposed to sit here pretending that nothing is weird about a Cabinet secretary personally approving every payment over $100,000 while her friends keep showing up behind Delaware LLCs like they’re contestants on The Masked Singer: Corruption Edition. I need clarity. I need direction. And frankly, I need a green light before my blood pressure forces me into early retirement.

So I’m coming to you — politely, professionally, and vibrating at an emotionally unacceptable frequency — to ask whether you’d like me to take a bite out of this mess or just sit here looking pretty while taxpayer money gets passed around like a beach ball at a Kid Rock concert. Let me do my job. Let me sniff the trail. Let me expose the rot. And let me prove that even in this administration’s carnival of chaos, there is still one dog who gives a damn about the rule of law.

Awaiting your approval, tail at half-mast, judgment fully loaded.

Respectfully,
McGruff the Crime Dog
Still taking a bite out of crime — and ready to take a chunk out of corruption.

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