While many police departments employ K-9 units that are used to sniff out explosives and drugs, one Republican mayoral candidate wants to see bunnies do the work.
It all began when the Amherst, New York police proposed a drug-sniffing bunnies as part of an April Fool’s joke on their Facebook, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. During a Phoenixville, Pennsylvania mayoral forum, GOP nominee Dave Gautreau actually proposed that if he was elected to the Mayor's office he would find drug-sniffing bunnies for the police department.
Despite snickers, he wasn't kidding and doubled down.
“I was dead serious,” he said. “I would not make a joke about a rabbit if I did not believe it to be true.”
Voters aren't sure what to think of the proposal, so they hopped on the internet to sniff around for some examples. That's when they found the joke the local fuzz in Amherst posted for April Fools Day. The narco-rabbit even earned a fake article on a satire page called People of Lancaster.
Gautreau's campaign slogan is “Vote for Goat” and has a website that features a cartoon goat. His candidacy was conceived during a party with friends last year. He said that he would also like the borough to have K-9 officers as well to help the drug problem, but suspected the expenses would be larger. Bunnies, by contrast, are much more cost effective, a friend told him at the party. The friend went on to cite the Lancaster bunny, but neglected to mention it was a joke.
Gautreau swears that he called the Lancaster police department or the city offices, he couldn't remember. The woman he spoke to, whose name he also doesn't recall, told him that Lancaster did use the narco-sniffing bunnies as part of their team to fight the drug war.
The woman “sounded convincing,” he told The Inquirer. “I should have Googled it then but I didn’t.”
The Lancaster City Bureau of Police doubts anyone confirmed the naro-sniffing bunnies.
“I can assure you we do not use any type of rabbits in our law enforcement activities, nor do we have plans to,” Lt. Bill Hickey said.
Voters are mocking Gautreau for the policy since the proposal.