It’s never an easy decision to re-home a beloved pet.
But when you refuse to re-home a dog despite their obvious misery and your inability it to meet their needs — well, that’s just cruel.
And, unfortunately, with the recent news about Joe Biden’s infamous dog, Commander, it seems the Biden White House falls more on the side of cruelty.
On Wednesday the White House announced that the Bidens have given Commander to relatives, in the wake of numerous reports of Commander attacking and severely injuring Secret Service agents, apparently without provocation.
The New York Post initially reported Commander’s attacks on Secret Service members in July 2023, and in an article published Wednesday, the Post reported that records obtained by journalist John Greenewald via a Freedom of Information Act request reveal 24 documented attacks on Secret Service members and White House staff by Commander.
Several of these incidents drew blood, even requiring stitches and antibiotics, with an attack in June 2023 requiring a 20-minute pause in White House tours to clean up the blood on the floor.
As described in the report on the incident, “Video of the incident shows [the agent] enter the Kennedy Garden while Commander, who was off the leash and on the opposite side of the garden at the time, run at a high rate of speed towards [the agent and] jump towards [the agent] and take [them] to the ground.”
In emails obtained by Greenewald and shared in CNN’s report, the fear of this dog was palpable, with one agent emailing their team to say the “recent dog bites have challenged us to adjust our operational tactics when Commander is present — please give lots of room. …[We] must be creative to ensure our own personal safety.”
CNN also noted, interestingly, that Commander only entered in the White House in December 2021, when he was still a puppy, and that, even though records show these incidents began in 2022, Commander was only re-homed, according to a White House statement, in the fall of 2023.
Should Joe Biden have adopted a dog at his age and ability?
The White House’s statement on the matter tried to make the whole debacle look as good as possible, with Jill Biden’s spokeswoman Elizabeth Alexander saying, “President and first lady care deeply about the safety of those who work at the White House and those who protect them every day. Despite additional dog training, leashing, working with veterinarians, and consulting with animal behaviorists, the White House environment simply proved too much for Commander.”
Now, if Commander was a family dog that had been with the family for many years, their reluctance to give him away would be more understandable.
However, as CNN informed us, they only adopted Commander in 2021, around the same time the Bidens had to give their dog Major away for similar reasons.
Was Commander only a photo op then? A cute dog adopted simply to make Biden seem more relatable and maybe distract from Biden’s age and other obvious deficiencies as president?
Clearly, Commander was a high needs dog that needed more specialized training than the Bidens were able or willing to give him.
He was clearly uncomfortable around Secret Service and White House staff, yet he was only given away when he was creating too much bad PR for the Biden White House.
Again, Commander seemed more of a social media character or a prop than a beloved family pet, adopted by a cantankerous octogenarian who can barely perform the bare minimum tasks of his own job.
Keeping him, under these circumstances, was nothing short of cruelty.
The moment it was clear he was unhappy at the White House and needed more training than the Bidens could give, he should’ve been re-homed, instead of being left to terrorize Secret Service members just trying to do their jobs.
Commander did not belong in the White House. He should have been with people who loved him and could give him the attention he needed.
And it shouldn’t have taken 24 unprovoked attacks on Biden’s staff for that to happen.
