Tiger King star Joe Exotic is once again making a public appeal to Donald Trump, asking to be pardoned from prison — and this time, he’s upped the ante a bit, suggesting that the President-elect should also appoint him as the head of the Fish and Wildlife Service.
The plea was made via a letter addressed to Trump and shared with Radar Online, in which Exotic wrote that he was “scared as hell” of a Kamala Harris presidency, and then claimed he was one of “a lot of people [who] went to bat for you in 2021, [and] have been living in hell ever since then.”
Continuing, Exotic wrote, “Everyone hopes you keep the promises you made during your campaign, which include pardoning everyone sooner than later in January 2025. Some of those very people have been stuck in solitary confinement, forced to live like rats, have killed themselves in prison, or have died. Some, like myself, have fought like hell to hang on, hoping for you to win this election.”
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Moving on to his post-incarceration aspirations, Exotic expressed his desire to be named head of the Fish and Wildlife Service. “It is time to bring some honesty to this department because the former director, Dan Ash, only looked out for himself and his position within the Association of Zoos and Aquariums. (He used his federal position to put me out of business and in prison to benefit his non-profit, the AZA).”
Going further, Exotic proposed a new interpretation of endangered species protections. “Hundreds of millions of dollars are being wasted within this department, the Endangered Species Act of 1973 was written to protect the animals and their habitats on our lands. It was not meant to be used to create illegal monopolies, as it has been in the past, allowing only certain people to profit from this Act and putting their competitors out of business.”
Exotic’s previous attempts to convince Trump to pardon him have fallen short — in 2019, he even claimed he was “too innocent and too gay” for it to happen, even after he rented a limo to pick him up from prison.
Exotic is currently behind bars on a number of charges, including two counts of murder for hire and a number of wildlife trafficking violations. As of now, he’s set to be released in 2036.
