As I come back to a status of slightly more active posting, coming down off of my COVID induced sabbatical, I have to say that it seems like I’m coming back to a somewhat chaotic time, to say the least.
The long-awaited report of the Attorney General’s accident has hit the media, and I suspect it’s only going to be the start. There will be the inevitable civil lawsuit, as well as more details to come from there. Plus, if someone tries to make something happen during the legislative session over misdemeanor charges, I’m sure there will be more details that will continue to drip out.
But in the meantime, did everyone notice that we have two candidates aggressively pursuing the vacancy in of the office of School and Public Lands – Jordan Youngberg & Brock Greenfield – with at least 1-2 more eyeing it up?
And mentioning the next Attorney General’s race.. it did not escape many people’s attention that former Attorney General Marty Jackley was at the GOP Central Committee meeting events on February 5 & 6, saying hello.
After ginning themselves up on the words of Bruce Whalen vodcasting to them a couple weeks back, the leader of the group of people who want to primary John Thune in 2022 – Julie Korth – is promoting weirdness and is suggesting people rethink their churches because apparently they need to be more conservative..
The anti-Thune group seems to have completely jumped the shark at this point, and has long devolved into goofiness, with retirees and bored people spending their winter hours sating themselves on memes.
With this type of activity a year out from the time when candidates start coming out of the woodwork, a few predictions for what I think we’re going to see place.
Primaries at the State or Federal level?
Meh. Just not seeing anything to take seriously.
As noted, I think we’re seeing a lot of goofiness and buffoonery. Maybe the anti-‘s could get someone to take the hit for their team, but didn’t we see this last election? When you are getting yourself puffed up to use candidates like Lora Hubbel or Liz May to be your messenger, you can prepare for the incumbent to defeat them with a vote of 75-80%.
Primary convention contests?
We’ve got at least one right now.. and I think there’s a possibility we may will have a couple. School & Lands obviously. AG? Likely. Anything beyond that is pretty unsure.
Legislative contests?
Now here’s something we haven’t spoken about for a while. In case you might have forgotten, we’re moving into re-districting later this year, and everything that was old will now be new again. Plus there will be 13 seats up due to term limits.
Here’s where we’re going to see a lot of new faces, some old faces shifting to another chamber, and some hard-fought battles. No specifics as of yet, but when we see realignments, we get people who pop up from outside of anyone’s radar, and decide to just run for the sake of running for office because they want to make a difference.
So keep an eye out for the chaos of 2022.
Not a lot of chaos. But maybe just a little.
That Thune page is a sight to behold. It’s like Qanon and Sidney Powell had a baby. It’s not so much that I disagree with them, it’s that they are so uninformed and have no sense of political history pre Trump. They don’t know even the basics. Oh well.
Two of the three organizers already left. One, Karla Lems, VP of Lincoln County Republicans, apparently left to moderate some group on the even more whacko Gab social media platform.
Half the people are from out of state. Another quarter are lurkers. What a joke.
On another note, I hope Marty gets back in the game.
Which seats are open in the legislature? Pat, are you doing candidate workshops again?
The party had legislative workshops, but I’m always happy to sit down one on one.
https://mylrc.sdlegislature.gov/api/Documents/72128.pdf
That’s just a smattering of them, as we usually end up with 1/4 – 1/3 of the seats open annually because of various reasons. And with redistricting, a completely new dynamic is introduced, because many will have brand new districts.
It does seem like a lot of people believe that Senator Thune has tenure and that it is wrong for folks to want to see a primary challenge; I haven’t seen the referenced website, and I don’t need to do so in order to wish for a primary challenge. It’s my personal opinion that Senator Thune has been in DC long enough and that the State and Country need someone else in that office.
I received inquiries about the “Primary John Thune 2022” facebook group and looked at it enough to see you have to join it to read it and I sure don’t want to join it. I imagine that most of the people who have joined the group have done so for the entertainment value.
I looked at the SOS site to see if they had registered as a PAC and they weren’t there, so I concluded they aren’t raising any money. Or if they are, they’re doing it wrong. They don’t seem to have a candidate, either. With the primary less than 18 months away it’s pretty clear they have no idea what they’re doing.