South Park has taken aim at the American far-right once again, and this time, no puppy is safe.
In the latest episode of the long-running animated series — part of its 27th season — creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone skewer controversial US political figures including Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, Ohio Senator JD Vance, and even Donald Trump, in a chaotic satire that doesn’t just push boundaries, it annihilates them.
The episode follows South Park Elementary’s ever-uptight counsellor Mr. Mackey, who’s fallen on hard times after losing his job. Faced with an £8,000-a-month “nut” (slang for financial obligation), he’s advised by his banker to consider joining ICE, the controversial U.S. immigration agency. The kicker? A cushy £100,000 salary and a £50,000 signing bonus.
Enter Kristi Noem, voiced in fictional form as the gun-toting, puppy-shooting face of ICE. In a twisted orientation video, animated Noem addresses new recruits: “A few years ago, I had to put my puppy down by shooting it in the face, because sometimes doing what’s important means doing what’s hard.” The episode takes the quote — based on a real-life anecdote — and runs with it. Hard. Noem is later shown gunning down several more puppies in increasingly absurd scenarios.
Things only get more unhinged from there. In one scene, Mackey and Noem storm a children’s theatre production of Dora the Explorer Live! as part of an ICE raid. When a panicked audience member’s service dog catches Noem’s eye, she immediately shoots it. Standard South Park chaos ensues.
As Mackey climbs the ICE ranks, his new position lands him at Mar-a-Lago, where Trump makes a cameo, joined by a shrunken, baby-sized JD Vance. The pint-sized senator proceeds to assist Trump and Satan with baby oil, because of course he does.
In true South Park fashion, the satire didn’t stop with the episode itself. The real ICE department jumped on the hype, using stills from the show’s teaser to advertise jobs on social media. Parker and Stone fired back with their signature scorched-earth sarcasm, asking if anyone still thought they were relevant and hashtagging “#eatabagofdicks” for good measure.
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The jab follows earlier backlash from the White House after the Season 27 premiere, with spokesperson Taylor Rogers dismissing the series as irrelevant for the past two decades and accusing the left of “hypocrisy” for suddenly embracing its political critiques.
For a show long dismissed as immature or out of touch, South Park is once again proving it knows exactly how to hit a nerve… and then kick it repeatedly for laughs.
