Noem was coming off two days of disastrous interviews on CBS, NewsNation, Newsmax and Fox Business about her just-released book. Interviewers pressed her on something she edited out of her book (whether or not she had ever met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a question she still hasn't answered) and something she left in her book (that she once killed her own dog because it was mean and couldn't be trained).
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So when it was time to appear on Fox News on Tuesday night, you figured she was finally landing in a safe spot where she would answer a few softballs and once again move to the top of Donald Trump's list of running mates.
Then again, maybe not. Perhaps that's why she bailed.
She canceled that Fox News appearance. The reason given was bad weather. The Daily Beast's Justin Baragona reported that "the governor's team specifically cited a snowstorm in her home state of South Dakota."
Yes, there was a winter advisory in the Black Hills of South Dakota, but here's the deal: Noem was already in New York City and there was nothing so dire about the weather in South Dakota that it required the governor's immediate attention. Though a spokesperson for Noem told RealClearPolitics that the governor "has sold a lot of books on this tour and is back in South Dakota to be prepared for some potential emerging bad weather systems."
Meanwhile, on CNN, anchor Dana Bash said Noem "abruptly canceled" a scheduled appearance on Wednesday's "Inside Politics."
Fox News host Greg Gutfeld seemed especially annoyed that Noem was a no-show on his program, and he ripped off several jokes about it. He said on air, "Who knows why she canceled?" When we asked how her week was going, she replied 'ruff.' Maybe it wasn't bad weather, I heard it was raining cats and dogs. I tried to convince Noem to stay and do our show. I even told her my dog Gus had all his shots. She said not yet he hasn't."
Gutfeld even brought on a colleague, Dana Perino, for a fake interview. He asked Perino, “So, Dana, aka Gov. Noem, did you write the book yourself?”
Perino said, "You know, that's a great question for someone who wrote the book, and I don't think I will dignify your question with a response. There are so many other important issues in the world, like animal cruelty."