Title: How Peanut the Squirrel Wreaked Havoc on New York State Wildlife Enforcement

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now we head to Albany with WNYC and Gothamist reporter, Jon Campbell, who covers the capital of New York State for us. Later on in this segment, we'll get his take on how Zohran Mamdani, of course, the Democratic Party's nominee for mayor of New York City, would have to try to work with state lawmakers to make the core parts of his agenda a reality if he wins election.

You know that most of his policy proposals, or at least many of the big ones, like free buses, universal free child care, others, rely on his ability to garner enough support from the state legislature, and then on top of that, not have things vetoed by Governor Hochul, who has yet to endorse him. Remember, he himself is an assembly member representing Long Island City and Astoria. We'll talk about his existing relationships and the work he would need to do up in Albany if he becomes mayor, but also, Jon brings us his reporting.

Maybe you've seen this story on Gothamist or heard his radio version, the story that went viral right before the presidential election last year, probably the last thing you expected us to be talking about today, Peanut the squirrel, the pet squirrel. His capture and subsequent death became a rallying cry for right wingers fanning the flames of the ongoing culture war. Jon's with us now to share Peanut story. If you don't know it yet and why it's left New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation in shambles, in some respects, and what the policy implications are of that. Hey, Jon, thanks as always for coming on.

Jon Campbell: Thanks for having me, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Remind everyone who was Peanut the Squirrel and why was he being kept as a pet?

Jon Campbell: Yes, absolutely. I mean, Peanut the Squirrel was an Internet-famous squirrel, which is a kind of an odd sentence, I acknowledge. This was a squirrel that was very, very popular on Instagram and TikTok. His owner was a guy named Mark Longo, who's 35 years old now, and would post these kind of humorous videos of Peanut the squirrel in a cowboy hat or holding a sign that says, "Paint me like one of your French squirrels," or leaping off of the refrigerator into his hand. This squirrel built up this really, really big following, or I should say Mark Longo built up this big following on the squirrel's behalf.

It was, by Mark's telling, he found this squirrel about seven or eight years ago in New York City. It's kind of difficult to fact check that. He says that he came across a dead adult squirrel in the middle of the road. This baby squirrel was next to the adult squirrel, and clung to him. He took it home, tried to rehab it. When he went to release it to the wild, the squirrel was attacked. It became an indoor squirrel after that. All of that is to say very, very Internet-famous squirrel that had hundreds of thousands of followers on social media, at least until this animal was seized by New York State and later euthanized by the county Department of Health out in Chemung County, near the Pennsylvania border.

Brian Lehrer: Why did the state seize this pet, and why did the county put it to death?

Jon Campbell: This is at the heart of why we did this reporting, trying to get the answer of why that happened and the lingering effects. We go into it in quite some detail on the podcast version, which is in the NYC NOW podcast feed, if you're interested. We foiled. We did an open records request, and got hundreds of records back. A lot of them are voicemails, threatening voicemails that came in after Peanut's death, but they also have a lot of officer write-ups, DEC officer write-ups that show how he came onto their radar screen.

Mark Longo opened an animal sanctuary near the city of Elmira on the Pennsylvania border a little more than two years ago in 2023. Early 2024, that's when the complaints start coming in. It's illegal to own a squirrel as a pet, a long-term pet in New York State. With a license, you can have a squirrel as-- you can rehab a squirrel for release back into the wild, or you can have what's known as an exhibitor's license where maybe it's part of some educational program, but Mark Longo didn't have either of those.

The documents that we reviewed and got through this open records request show that in May 2024, a DEC officer went to his farm, his animal sanctuary, spoke to him. He wasn't there, so he spoke to him by phone. Later in the day, they had a discussion about the licensure requirements. Mark Longo told him that the squirrel was in Connecticut at this point. The DEC officer goes back to the people who complained and say, "Hey, listen, what am I supposed to do? I'm not going to get a search warrant for a squirrel." A couple months later, in July, Mark Longo started showing a raccoon in his videos named Fred. That's when things really turned because raccoons can carry rabies without showing symptoms. That's when they decide to seize the squirrel.

Brian Lehrer: And the raccoon, Fred, who was also euthanized, right?

Jon Campbell: Yes, absolutely. This all happened on October 30th, 2024. About a dozen DEC employees, some of them officers, some of them wildlife staff, show up at Mark Longo's home with a search warrant signed by a judge. They go looking for the squirrel and the raccoon. They find the squirrel in a bathtub, a Jacuzzi style bathtub under some clothes. They find the raccoon in an unzipped suitcase in a closet. They also find a handful of firearms, one of which the DEC officers said, pretty clearly in their telling, was violated the state's gun control law.

This became a big thing. They had to get the search warrant amended so they could take that gun as well. They take the animals. This is a big point of contention here. One of the DEC wildlife biologists says she was bitten by Peanut the squirrel as they were seizing it. That is kind of the final nail in the coffin, so to speak, to have the animals euthanized to test for rabies. They both tested negative for rabies.

Brian Lehrer: Peanut's death becomes a symbol of the culture war, not just in New York State, but across the country. Here is a clip of Elon Musk on Joe Rogan the day before election day last year.

Elon Musk: Here's the thing about the whole squirrel thing is that how can it be that we live in America, supposedly land of the free, and the government can barge into your home with guns? If you resist, you're going to get shot, and then take your pets and execute them. If they can do that to your pets, what do you think they can do to you?

Joe Rogan: It's not an exaggeration.

Elon Musk: Absolutely.

Joe Rogan: It sounds like you're, "Oh, that's so crazy." How can you make that connection? Why would you kill that cute little squirrel that was obviously a pet and trained from the time it was a baby? If you see the interaction that guy has with that squirrel, it was wonderful. It was really cute.

Brian Lehrer: Joe Rogan and Elon Musk talking about this squirrel in November. In your piece, you note that J.D. Vance brought up Peanut's death on the campaign trail too. We're getting texts. One that says, "New York government overreach. New York government overreach killed Peanut the squirrel." Another one, Lauren in Durham, writes, "I have not followed Peanut or seen the New Superman, but the furore over Peanut and Superman saving the squirrel in the film seem like a meaningful coincidence." Another listener writes, "The Department of Environmental Conservation destroyed Peanut and Fred before the tests for rabies came back negative."

I don't know if you can confirm or refute that assertion of fact, but I guess that first text that I read gives an indication of why it became a culture war issue on the right, that it's government overreach as it's perceived.

Jon Campbell: Well, let me tackle the last one first. Yes, Peanut and Fred were destroyed because the way you test for rabies, you have to take a brain sample. There's not really a way to do that without decapitating the animals. Yes, I mean that's factual, but there's no other way to test for rabies. On the government overreach piece, I mean this is the heart of the debate, and this is why this story has gotten such attention is it's kind of like a Rorschach test.

I mean some people look at this story, and say, "It's a squirrel, it's a raccoon. Why would the government care about that? Why would they put such resources into seizing and euthanizing these animals?" But then the other side says, "Well, it's illegal to have these animals as pets in New York. Mr. Longo was warned, was visited by a DEC officer months before this all happened. He did start the process of getting his rehabber license, but did not finish it according to the DEC, but even still, that is to release the animal back in the wild. That's not to keep it as a long term pet."

You have just intense feelings on both sides of this. Once the Joe Rogan's and the Elon Musk's and the J.D. Vance's of the world started talking about this, it really, really, really blew up. As you can hear in the podcast, the backlash was incredible within the DEC. I mean they got hundreds of voicemails, many of them specific and threatening. I mean you can hear some of them in the podcast that I mean literally threatened murder of specific DEC leaders. It had a very significant impact on the agency that still lingers to this day.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we can take a few phone calls on this, if you have anything to say or ask. There is one piece of the story that we haven't gotten to yet with Jon that I think we need to get to to connect the dots, and then we can take more texts, which have been coming in from the start and a couple of phone calls. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. As we talk about not just the saga of Peanut the squirrel, but now the fallout from the saga of Peanut the squirrel. Jon, you interviewed Matthew Krug, the vice president of the Police Benevolent Association of New York State, about the Peanut situation. Here's what he had to say about the impact this has all had on the Department of Environmental Conservation overall.

Matthew Krug: Initially, right afterwards, after we got through all the threats, we weren't allowed to do any wildlife seizures for months and months and months. We weren't allowed to execute any warrants without the acting commissioner's approval. Some of these were simple warrants, and we're waiting weeks and weeks and weeks to be able to execute them, and go on, do our seizure, do our investigation, because we still have a job to do, essentially. It's environmental protection. We went through a process right afterwards where we weren't allowed by management to even do our road checkpoints during big game season looking for illegal wildlife. A deer being transferred back across state borders, loaded guns.

Brian Lehrer: The Peanut saga stopped the DEC from doing work that might be less controversial, let's say. Maybe you explain to our audience a little bit about the role of the Department of Environmental Conservation broadly in this respect. Because from Queens, where I grew up, you don't have a lot of wildlife enforcement.

Jon Campbell: The Department of Environmental Conservation is a big agency in New York, and it's tasked with protecting the state's environment and its natural resources. A piece of that is wildlife enforcement; ensuring that wildlife is protected and kept wild. That's how they got involved in this Peanut the squirrel saga to begin with. What Matt Krug, the union rep, is discussing there are the various ways where they felt like they had their hands tied in the months that followed this and because of all those threats that came in.

There was a lot of fear within the agency. There were bomb threats to 10 different DEC buildings. Thousands of workers were allowed to work from home for a period of time. There was a lot of fear within the agency that continues to this day. He went through some of the ways that he feels like he's been handcuffed. In the Gothamist version of the story, the way we illustrated that was we painted a scene of one of those wildlife checkpoints, one of the big game checkpoints during hunting season where DEC officers will be on the side of the road and will be looking for people who are transporting deer or who went out hunting that morning.

We painted a scene of the Throgs Neck Bridge actually. A big checkpoint usually each year, or almost every year, is on the Cross Bronx Expressway leading up to the Throgs Neck Bridge.

Brian Lehrer: Wait. You mean I have to take that back about being from Queens on the other side of the Throgs Neck Bridge not being relevant to this story?

Jon Campbell: It is relevant because once a year or so in November during big game season, the DEC traditionally would set up a checkpoint there. They would inspect over 100 deer in a day, even 3 bear on 1 day back in 2021. They're looking for people in camo or in orange. People who are coming back from Pennsylvania or maybe the woods of the Hudson Valley. That didn't happen last November in the aftermath of this Peanut situation. The union rep says that very much this was in response to the fear created by those threats, that agency leaders didn't want to create another viral backlash if they're out in public, and they seized the wrong person's animal or whatever. That sense of fear still permeates the agency even 10 months later.

Brian Lehrer: Couple of texts coming in on the opposite side of the text that came in earlier. This is more supportive of what the state did. Listener writes, "Wildlife laws are very clear in New York and New Jersey. I've rehabbed wildlife, a raccoon, and had to work under a professional who had a license. They were very clear, 'Do not post anything on social media because this is a tricky issue.'" Another listener writes, "They are wild animals. To the people texting in saying it's overreach, there are laws to protect wild animals. Us humans own wildlife. They aren't pets." Let's take a phone call. Oh, we don't have Darcy in Rockland anymore. Darcy was calling to make a great political point, but let's try Pat in Arizona. You're on WNYC. Hi, Pat.

Pat: Hi. In Appalachia and southeastern United States, squirrel hunting is pretty traditional and squirrel meat. I was in West Virginia maybe 20 years ago, and people thought nothing of hunting squirrels and having fried squirrel for dinner or put it in a stew called Brunswick stew. I suspect a lot of the people who are on the right don't realize this, or else they're total hypocrites because squirrels are traditionally hunted animals and eaten for food.

Brian Lehrer: Pat, thank you very much. Jon, is that a separate issue? We were talking about somebody who's keeping a squirrel as a pet, and that was apparently against the law without a license. Is it legal to hunt squirrels in New York State, do you know?

Jon Campbell: I believe it is. There have been various bills over the years to limit squirrel hunting competitions, but I believe hunting squirrels is legal. Now I'm starting to doubt myself a little bit there, but this is a separate issue. This is somebody keeping a squirrel as a pet.

Brian Lehrer: To paraphrase what Darcy in Rockland was going to say, I see that Darcy had to get behind the wheel of a car, so dropped off. Darcy was going to say, "This is what's wrong with the Democratic Party. People are losing Medicare and people are focusing on the damn squirrel," what Darcy told our screener who says she's on her way to a protest at Congressman Lawler's office. The GOP knows how to skillfully pivot. I don't know if you've heard that from anywhere. Look what the Democratic run New York State has gotten itself into with this more backlash that might be popular coming from the right because they're focusing on this rather than the big issues. Anybody else saying that besides Darcy in Rockland?

Jon Campbell: Yes. I mean, to a certain extent, there are some on the left that think maybe the right weaponized this issue and other issues, but then there are some on the right that view this as a classic case of big state government overreach and view this as emblematic. There's a little bit of that on both sides. I can't believe I haven't mentioned this to this point, and could maybe derail the conversation here, but some of the early complaints that came in looked at the fact that Mark Longo, the owner of Peanut the squirrel, has a popular OnlyFans page where he would sell sexually explicit content. Still does.

That said, he says that the squirrel never showed up on that page. That being said, his username on that site is Squirrel Daddy, and his account makes clear that he's "Peanut's dad." That's another thing that we get into on the NYC NOW podcast on this.

Brian Lehrer: There are all kinds of things I could say in response to that, and I'm not going to say any of them, just let people-

Jon Campbell: Probably for the best.

Brian Lehrer: -make of that what they will. As you say, there was no particular accusation in that respect. By the way, to the transcript of Darcy's point, when she said people are losing Medicare, I think she meant Medicaid. As just a little preview in our next segment, we're going to be talking to the finance journalist, William Cohan, about how President Trump's nominee to run the Bureau of Labor Statistics, now that he's fired the previous head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, actually says Medicare is unsustainable and needs to be sunsetted along Social Security.

We're going to get to that. Jon Campbell, our Albany correspondent, with us just for another few minutes. Jon, I want to switch gears here and talk about the prospect of a Mayor Zohran Mamdani for just a second. This is relevant to you as our Albany bureau chief, obviously, because one of the major questions when it comes to Mamdani's policy agenda is whether he could get enough state legislators and the governor to go along with some of his proposals, including taxes on corporations, new taxes on corporations, and people with an income of more than $1 million.

Also raising the minimum wage to $30 by 2030, $30 an hour, the free buses proposal, the universal free childcare proposal. I think each of those things, correct me if I'm stating too many on that list, require Albany's approval. How would he have to go about trying to get it?

Jon Campbell: I don't think you're overstating it, especially something like free childcare for all New Yorkers. You would need state funding almost certainly to implement that. New York is a strong state government sate. Albany, for time immemorial, has had a lot of sway over New York City. Every mayor needs approval from Albany for something. Zohran Mamdani's policy agenda needs it for a lot of things. I mean, it's crucial to achieving his policy goals is to get his now current colleagues in the state legislature to go along with it, but also Governor Hochul. He's going to have a difficult time getting Governor Hochul on board with, say, raising income taxes.

That's something to this point that she has strenuously objected to, even as many Democrats in the legislature would like her to do it. I think there is a possibility that that could be up for interpretation in the future given the federal cuts that have happened and are coming down the pike as well, but that is separate from the question of Zohran Mamdani's policy here. I mean, I think you already see him trying to create coalitions. You see him reaching out to many different people. Just today you saw Assemblymember Jordan Wright, who is a big Cuomo supporter, come out and endorse Mamdani, but you have not seen Kathy Hochul do that yet. That's something that could loom large going forward here.

Brian Lehrer: One more question on that, and then it looks like we have a very interesting caller on Peanut the squirrel, somebody who used to work for Governor Hochul and with respect to this, even so, Benjamin, hang on there on Line 8. I mean, the New York State Legislature, Jon, as you know, and as many of our listeners know, has a Democratic super majority. That means they have enough votes to override vetoes by the governor if all the Democrats stick together.

Any indication what Mamdani's relationship is with Carl Heastie, the speaker of the assembly, or Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Senate majority leader who would be needed to whip, as they call it, a lot of these votes in order to keep that super majority together. He's been in the assembly for four years now. Does he have close relations there? Is there reason to think that he could get them on board? We talk too much about Governor Hochul in this respect.

Jon Campbell: Zohran Mamdani is certainly more familiar with Speaker Carl Heastie because they're in the same chamber. Speaker Heastie has said nice things about Zohran Mamdani. He very, very much operates by consensus. If the majority of his conference wants it, then that's what they do. It's more important that Zohran Mamdani and the assembly builds consensus within that conference rather than just getting the leader's support.

The same could be true in the Senate too, where actually Democrats, I believe, right now, they're one seat shy of a super majority. It always bounces back and forth there. All of that to be said too, the super majorities are kind of-- I find them to be blown out of proportion because they never, ever try to overturn vetoes ever. I mean, in my entirety, I've been covering Albany for about 15 years. It's never happened once. It never even attempted as far as I can remember. It gets overblown a little bit.

Brian Lehrer: Let me sneak in this Peanut-related call. Benjamin in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, there.

Benjamin: Hey, how's it going? I mean, I think the Peanut story is just, it's super interesting, and this is just my own perspective on this.

Brian Lehrer: Just tell us your relationship to-- I just want to hear what you told our screener your relationship to this story.

Benjamin: Yes, absolutely. I was one of the governor's speechwriters during October and during Peanut and was kind of an observer to a lot of this. I think there was a, this is my opinion, but I think an electoral component to the way the Peanut story got played up, especially on social media. If you go back to that clip with Elon Musk, I think there was the hope that this would be kind of an October surprise, that they'd get sort of Squirrel Waco out of this and be able to really turn it into an electoral issue nationally. Whether that worked or not, I don't know. It's the most 2025 version of this.I think that the narrative around this attack on this innocent creature is a very long narrative going back decades.

Brian Lehrer: Benjamin, thank you for that input. I think we hear the enormity of the Peanut story in terms of it having a political impact. Just in Benjamin's language there, Jon, he says, "I was a speechwriter for the governor during Peanut," like people would say during COVID or during Hurricane Sandy.

Jon Campbell: That's absolutely true within the Department of Environmental Conservation. I mean, there is definitely BP, before Peanut, and AP, after Peanut. I mean, they very much view that within the agency itself.

Brian Lehrer: WNYC's Albany reporter, Jon Campbell, read his reporting on this on Gothamist as well as hear it on the radio. Jon, thanks a lot.

Jon Campbell: Thank you so much.

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