Last week, Derek Guy, the ultra-online brain behind the X account @dieworkwear, posted a screenshot of one of Laura Loomer’s recent posts, along with this: “i setup a fake dog food company last month, bought purina at the pet store, and paid laura loomer $100 for this post,” sparking confusion. Was Guy trolling? How deep did the troll go? Did Loomer really eat dog food—“bison topper”? And if Guy hadn’t gotten her to do it, who had?
To peel back the first layer of the onion, let’s look at the source material. Loomer, the conservative extremist and Donald Trump’s recently appointed right-hand-woman whom Marjorie Taylor Greene called “extremely racist,” did indeed post a video on September 6 in which she nom-noms some woof-woofs. Her former boss James O’Keefe, the ousted CEO of Project Veritas, described her in the foreword to Loomer’s 2021 memoir, Loomered, as “[not] wired like other people.” It’s as if, he writes, she is in possession of a brain that “doesn’t process information like the rest of us.” O’Keefe also notes that “she appears to be functionally immune to fear, to shame, and to embarrassment.”
In the dog-food-eating video, Loomer opens a plastic pouch of what she calls “supplements” for dogs. “You can see here, Pawsitive Bison. It clearly says ‘dog food topper,’ and I’m going to put this in my mouth right now.” She takes a pinch from the bag and drops it into her open mouth, chews, swallows, and says, “Oh.” Then she declares it tastes “like meat” and dips back in for more.
X content
This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from.
Self-described “Trump loyalist” Roger Stone responded, “Gross,” to which Loomer replied, “This is very healthy dog food topper for your pups Roger! Next time I see you I will give you some Pawsitive.” (Loomer did not respond to a request for comment on whether the endorsement was paid.)
Pawsitive, it turns out, is not a @dieworkwear prank, nor anyone else’s prank. It is an operational pet food company that, Loomer says, is “fighting for free speech.” (Russell Brand also filmed an endorsement for Pawsitive, but did not eat the dog bison snack. Purina appears to be entirely uninvolved.) And Pawsitive is just one in a network of companies that Rumble—the independent Canadian-founded video and web services platform that hosts Truth Social, funded by venture capitalists including Peter Thiel and JD Vance—described in a press release as “Rumble-branded products,” linked by that same passion for “free speech,” fit men, bison chunks, and a distrust in the medical establishment.
According to the site, Pawsitive’s “Chief Dog Officer” is a blond dachshund named Vienna The “Sausage” Dog, but its CEO, Foster Coulson, is a Canadian serial entrepreneur. (On his personal Instagram back in 2019 he alluded to “monetiz[ing]” his “cream weiner dog,” Dolce, in a post that showed the animal next to a bag of Royal Canine kibble.) One of his early ventures, described in a bio on one of his sites, was “a patented product line that used Ice made from water for industrial cleaning applications.” Along with Pawsitive and Coulson Ice Blast, he is the CEO and chairman of the Wellness Company, which sells “detox bundles,” telehealth services, and first aid kits. (Canine emergency aid kits are among Pawsitive’s offerings.) He also cofounded Be Naked, a “Rumble-branded” product that the platform has described as “redefining rugged masculinity with its powerful line of wellness products tailored for men, by men.” A pop-up disclaimer upon entering the site: “If you’re one of ‘those people’ who use the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’ because you’re intimidated by real men who embrace their primal instincts, you should leave.” (Coulson did not respond to a request for comment.)
