Peanut the Squirrel Becomes Right-Wing Martyr in Final Election Push From the Extremely Online

Last week a squirrel died successful New York. Over the weekend, the squirrel became a awesome and martyr connected the right. As radical enactment up to vote, ballots are cast, and undecided voters marque their last decisions connected who to ballot for, Donald Trump’s surrogates similar Elon Musk are tweeting astir a squirrel.

Vote
For PNut!
For Liberty!
For Freedom!

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2024

P’Nut the squirrel was net famous. Mark Longo rescued it 7 years agone and raised it aft its parent died. P’Nut had an Instagram relationship and Longo had an OnlyFans relationship named for the squirrel, though P’Nut was not progressive successful the sultry shoots. On October 30, the Department of Environmental Conservation successful New York raided Longo’s location and seized P’Nut and a raccoon. P’Nut allegedly spot 1 of the officers during the raid. DEC past euthanized the squirrel to trial for rabies.

P’Nut captured the imaginativeness of the right, particularly the highly online right, successful the waning days of the election. Here, they said, was an illustration of Democratic authorities overreach. Longo, upset astir the decease of his beloved P’Nut, fueled the fire. “They treated maine similar I was a terrorist. They treated this raid arsenic if I was a cause dealer. They ransacked my location for 5 hours. They asked my wife, who is of German descent, what her migration presumption was. They asked if I had cameras successful my house. They wouldn’t let maine to spell to the bath without a constabulary escort, who past checked the backmost of the toilet to spot if I was hiding thing there,” Longo told the New York Post.

©Image via X.

The Post has published aggregate stories astir the squirrel since the raid. The Editorial Board of The Wall Street Journal penned an op-ed astir authorities powerfulness and P’Nut. The House Judiciary GOP posted “Justice for Peanut” connected its X account. Elon Musk posted astir the squirrel an absurd fig of times implicit the play and, arsenic of this writing, his pinned tweet is simply a telephone to ballot for P’Nut. A fake connection from the Trump run astir the dormant squirrel went viral but was rapidly debunked by the campaign itself.

Justice for Peanut.

— House Judiciary GOP 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 (@JudiciaryGOP) November 2, 2024

The memes flowed. Right-wing stalwart cartoonist Ben Garrison immortalized P’Nut successful a station connected X. In the cartoon, the squirrel is wearing a cowboy hat, 1 of his trademarks, and sporting a motion that reads “Vote Trump!” P’Nut looks astatine the viewer, his ample cartoon eyes welling with tears, shouting “Avenge me!” Another meme depicted a ghostly squirrel with its arms connected Trump’s shoulders arsenic helium sits successful the Oval Office. Others amusement P’Nut successful eden with Harambe, a beloved gorilla who died successful 2016 and became a meme superstar.

"Peanut the Squirrel…You shall beryllium avenged!"
On Nov 5th!
Vote Trump don't fto Peanut dice successful vain!
Ben Garrison Cartoon
Feel escaped to stock this representation acold and wide!!
RIP Peanut! pic.twitter.com/8hsgiKSkNx

— Real Ben Garrison Cartoons (@GrrrGraphics) November 2, 2024

There was a consciousness from the close online that the squirrel signaled the extremity of Kamala Harris and the Democrats. Here was a wide usurpation of a person’s rights and the cleanable martyr for their cause. “Are we going to triumph this predetermination due to the fact that of this f’ing squirrel?” Mike Benze, Executive Director of Foundation For Freedom Online said successful a station connected X.

Well, no. Should Trump triumph it won’t beryllium due to the fact that of a last-minute bump from radical upset that the authorities of New York killed an internet-famous squirrel. P’Nut is yet different grounds of the terminally online insanity that has plagued the GOP successful caller years. Part of what ended Ron DeSantis’s bid for the Presidential information successful January was his staff’s infatuation with weird online civilization warfare bullshit. He obsessed implicit Disney which work arsenic anemic and weird to mean voters. The last nail successful the coffin occurred erstwhile 1 of his too-online staffers published a fascist fancam.

And Trump is adjacent losing the highly online fascist vote. On November 2, achromatic nationalist groyper Nick Fuentes said he’d realized Trumpism is simply a cult. Fuentes yet mislaid religion successful Trump aft seeing his supporters formal up similar garbage.

The garbage happening isn’t playing good with Puerto Ricans either. After a comedian opened Trump’s caller Madison Square Garden rally with a racist gag that called Puerto Rico an “island of garbage” and Biden gaffed and called Trump supporters “garbage” (a remark helium claims was misheard), the GOP attempted to reclaim the label. Trump supporters dressed up similar garbage and Trump himself did a photo-op successful a garbage truck. Trump distanced himself from the comedian portion attempting to clasp the representation of his followers arsenic garbage.

It hasn’t landed. The Huffington Post sent a journalist to the plaything authorities of Pennsylvania to speech to Puerto Rican voters. One antheral told HuffPo that he’d ne'er voted earlier but decided to bash truthful aft proceeding the comedian’s joke. He saw the garbage motortruck photo-op arsenic an insult. “If helium didn’t person thing to bash with it, what’s helium doing successful the garbage truck?” He told HuffPo.

If Trump loses this predetermination it volition be, successful part, due to the fact that his run mislaid itself successful the condiment of the online world. As the predetermination entered the last stretch, Trump and his squad spent their days tweeting astir squirrels and garbage. It’s not a compelling pitch.