From Facebook, fresh off his nomination in an unopposed race for Attorney General, an endorsement for Gubernatorial Candidate Toby Doeden has been posted to Russell’s facebook group:
That’s a higher profile endorsement for Doeden in the few weeks until the runoff contest. As evidenced by his selection at convention, Lance holds significant sway with conservative activists within the party. Who have a tendency to vote no matter whether it’s rain or shine. And we’re facing new territory with July’s runoff election.
Very disappointing to read this.
🤦♂️
Although I don’t know Russell, this just validates all the criticism I’ve heard about his judgment.
Ravnsborg 2.0
worse than Ravnsborg
Ravnsborg did not abuse the authority of his office . Other than introduce himself as the AG when he got in trouble, it could be argued he was trying to pull rank on law enforcement officers but he didn’t go beyond that with any of them
AG just got moved to the primary ballot.
Indeed. The first action after becoming AG elect byMr. Russell, corrupter than most, is to ensure no more buffoons come out of the convention for his new job. One term only, if he can make it.
Some people who live immersed in politics don’t seem to understand that rank-and-file Republican voters rarely have time to do adequate research for downballot primaries. If most convention delegates couldn’t see through Russell, most primary voters probably wouldn’t have either.
Primaries, and especially downballot primaries, favor the candidate who can afford the most ads. If it weren’t for a black-swan fluke in which a fourth-place candidate broke 20 percent, a primary would have nominated Toby Doeden for governor.
This is performance art right? Hehe
I believe there are the votes during the upcoming session to move AG and SOS to primary. We saw the disaster at the convention voting these two whackos in.
Move them ALL to the existing statewide primary system ASAP! ALL statewide offices including State Treasurer, State Auditor, PUC Commissioner, Commissioner of School & Public Lands, Secretary of State and Attorney General.
Agreed. Any statewide office holder can damage the party. Move them all at once to a primary, or you’ll have to come back and do it again for the rest.
I will vote for that!!!!!!!!!!!
I will agree that they should all be on the ballot and let the people vote not just a select group.
Agree!
Authenticity and integrity are undefeated. I bet that really sticks in your craw?
When we think of Lance these are definitely not the words that come to mind.
When do Thune & Rounds step in to endorse Rhoden and throw their organizations/money behind him? It’s still odd to me that those two do not have a bigger presence in the party organization. It’s not like the old days where the top party leaders (Abdnor, Janklow, Pressler) were fighting each other for control. Their indifference is doing more harm than good.
It’s all rah rah go team until the team’s pet leopard bites your face. Just imagine this sort of crap for the next four years; i.e., Noem 2.0 except even worse.
Those fellows are insulated by cushy jobs in DC, and can afford to coast and let the planks of the GOP rot beneath their faux leather loafers. They may not even know what is going on with the elections here in South Dakota.
Other than Thune actually attending the convention and several of his staff actively involved in the party or delegates and him giving the party money to keep the lights on and hold a convention … ya I’m sure he’s never heard of it.
Schoenbeck as an independant? Lee or Jake?
Genuinely, Thank you for causing me laugh out loud. It’s been a day
I glad you can laugh out loud now, because you might be crying for 4 years after November.
It’s not your party.
My gut says that something is just not right with all of this..
VERY VERY sad if what my gut is saying is true.
We have to remember that if there is not a VERY Good legislature to keep the governor in check they have a lot of power.
Praying with all my heart that if what i fear is true Doeden doesn’t destroy South Dakota beyond what can be fixed.
All bets are now officially off. Whatever disaster can come from this is being ushered into the room on a serving cart, and placed on the feasting table in front of us. Eat rapaciously, drink deeply, enjoy.
AGREE!! Something is NOT right here!
Has there been a South Dakota Governor that has been impeached and ended up in prison? I have this gut feeling (Not heartburn) that if Doeden is elected Governor it will be his fate.
He will not be the only one either.
Doeden, Russell, and Baxter
Plus a few appointees of the Doeden administration.
This is a joke I am sick to think the damage these three will do!!
Play stupid games with power, stupid outcomes proliferate.
The GOP is setting me up for a purple ballot again
He endorses a guy who verifiably lies all. The. Time. I’ve written about it extensively + bring the receipts to prove it. Doeden is surrounded by people who have constant runins with the law, and are ruthless against anyone who doesn’t agree with them on everything.
Doeden says all of the grassroots verbiage and buzz words while his actions show complete opposite of that. And no matter what I do to show these people what a two faced grifter he is, they refuse to see it and they themselves lie to prop up their agenda (like CFL changing their 2025 scores on the 2026 scorecard so it doesn’t look so insane).
It’s truly terrifying.
Katie in my opinion Toby’s behavior has been the same for decades since we worked with him long ago. I am not a doctor but again in my opinion Toby Doeden is a pathological liar and a socio-path. He touts transparency yet he and his campaign crew some with a very sketchy past scrubbed Toby’s social media posts which show the real Toby Doeden. What is he afraid of? Voters and customers seeing the real Toby Doeden? His posts were a goldmine with him bullying women and others who disagreed with him. It was like he was proud to be the village jack*** and the dumbest.
What we viewed from our perspective was that he was not only physically a lazy person but most of all and most alarming being intellectually lazy.
I remember he posted a classic Libertarian lazy simpleton meme “Taxation if Theft” with some comments on his facebook page. A local normally low key and respected financial advisor sincerely and tactfully replied to Toby regarding his meme and tried to educate Toby how wrong it was and how things worked also being a strong advocate for public education. Toby lost interest and was unable to process what was being presented in a very simple way. Then typical Toby in caveman fashion started throwing insults at this financial advisor probably feeling insecure and feeling it was making him look like an idiot. The financial advisor maintained his composure ignoring the insults and simply tried to reframe his explanation again in a sincere attempt to help. Toby continued to escalate the insults and finally the financial advisor realized he was talking to a wall and left. Here is running for Governor. Can you imagine the damage he would do in office ignoring experts? No interest in taking the time to learn and study issues and needs of the state and government? That requires work, discipline and curiosity. I suppose someone could come in his office with Crayola crayons and draw pictures but Toby would probably get bored after a few minutes.
Toby has not changed much at all except he can cause a lot more damage and human suffering now.
Katie, Russell and Doeden made a deal. Doeden helped get Russell elected. If Doeden becomes governor, Russell will be Doeden’s puppet and will do whatever Doeden wants. He’s made the deal. The deed is sealed.
Shades of Donnie Frump
Exactly!
The thought of DOEDEN being governor scares me more and more each day. I wish his supporters would wake up. But then again, I wish this for POTUS supporters as well…
Scares you? South Dakota ain’t for the timid.
Katie I’d add that Toby frequently whined and complained about paying taxes on his FB page, with his “Taxation is Theft” and not long after he requested a TIF which was approved by the Aberdeen City Council for the apartment complex on the north side of town. That brought out a few replies one being the financial advisor. Many of those who replied where they disagreed with Toby or he sensed he was made to look bad or dumb or threw laughing emojis were blocked Many of those posts have been scrubbed though more than likely some locals took screen shots.
Regarding the apartment complex on the north side of town. My opinion is that even smaller local rental property owners could have purchased those properties and remodeled them without requesting a TIF from the city. Those properties are well built. It would take them longer to do it as many have already done this with properties they purchased that had been neglected. Plus there is a sense of pride of doing it on their own.
Would you be willing to talk to me in private? Is there a way to contact that financial advisor or someone who may have the screenshots?
Katie I would check with the Aberdeen community pages to see if anyone has what you need for screen shots. Unlike Toby Doeden the financial advisor I mentioned avoids drama. He is very well educated, successful, established, is a high producer but does not call attention to himself in the service to others in a profession where confidentiality is valued whether that be in business or volunteering. I’d like to respect his privacy.
It may still be the that Aberdeen has more millionaires per capita than any other city in the state. Most are down to earth, being humble, generous and kind towards others living modestly where you would never know.
Katie, try the Way Back Machine. Pretty clever tool for finding such archives.
https://web.archive.org/
Katie like you have any room to talk. I’m supporting rhoden, But someone like you flips people away.You did it with hansen. You are not helping you are hurting.
Hansen probably deserved it
Russell and Doeden have been working together for months.
Katie, you are bipolar. All of a sudden you have “seen the light” about the libertarians masquerading as republicans and you go on about how they throw the word “rino” around. Yet you do the same. You still use that term to speak about anyone who doesn’t agree with you 100%. You claim to be against extremists, yet still support fools like Ismay. You call people corrupt because you don’t like how they don’t take your BS. You talk to people on the other side of an issue to get their opinion or the facts. You just slander them and manipulate people. You are just an attention seeker who wants to appear intelligent and “in the know”, but you have a very tenous grasp on reality.
SD is the real looser….wouldn’t it been fun to have a young energetic new voice like Austin Hoffman who is about doing what is right without the games. Shame on the SD republican primary process.
What’s your source for that claim?
Not true – know your facts before you imply – Mr. Hoffman ran a clean campaign- Russell has alligations against him right now and Hoffman didn’t even bring that up in his campaign. I don’t see what anyone would have against Mr. Hoffman – A young professional who wants to get involved and there are nutbags handing out faulse accusations against him at the convention. Instead of handing out fliers who to vote for – they are handing out fliers who not to vote for – says a lot about somes character.
There are many McCrazies in McPherson who should worry less about tearing Mr Hoffman down and worry more about trying to rebuild their marriages and family relationships that all of this idiotic behavior has ruined. You know who you are…..
Agree!!
Hoffman campaigned against the job he wanted , saying it was not political.. AG is a very political job, look at other AGs around the country.
You must not have read any of the material he sent out or had a conversation with him. He knew it was a political position, he just wasn’t going to get caught up in the political BS that Lance took less than a week to. And he was the only one of the three to have kind of a plan.
Russell wasn’t elected in the Primary, elected at Convention where the right wingers loaded up precinct people in order to get their chose of candidate.
If Ahlers can’t beat Doeden, I don’t see how any Democrat could ever be elected governor.
As much as I loathe Doeden, he won’t lose to Ahlers in the current political climate. As long as he keeps parroting himself as Trump 2.0, South Dakota voters will gobble it up.
What’s your source for that claim?
(In response to Anonymous comment at 8:44pm)
Dems have until Aug 2 (I think) to replace Ahlers with Herseth or Sutton. Just saying’.
your comment prompted a googling of the age of Stephanie’s kid.
Zachary was born in December 2008. It is possible he has just graduated, or will graduate in one year.
The Empty Nest transition is a good time for a woman to make a career change.
This could be her time.
hmm she could be Governor at 56, serve 8 years, retire at 64. Or run for the White House
It’s her time. now or never.
Pretty funny. I knew Lance would do something dumb, because he always does. However, I assumed it would take a while to see it happen.
He is assuming that Doeden will win. It might be a close race. Polling shows that many voters consider Rhoden their second choice, if their favorite didnt win in the Primary. Almost no one favored Doeden as their second choice.
But the real takeaway is that Lance thinks anyone in the world gives a rip what Lance thinks. Truth is, only we political junkies pay any attention to nonsense like this.
The guy has campaigned on being just like Trump; he’s even making these wild claims like abolishing property taxes, which we know he won’t follow through with. Not sure what anyone expected. He’s probably lining up the state AG to be his personal attorney, too.
The convention system gave us Ravnsberg. Then it nearly nominated Dave Natvig over Jackley….three percent margin; Natvig was a clown. Now the convention gives us a guy too dumb to understand that Republican candidates shouldn’t get into the middle of Republican races they are not in. You stay in your own lane, for the good of the party.
Plus Larry might still win, in which case, Lance just outed himself as a dummy. Again.
Time for primaries in all these statewide races.
Lance Russell, “go dumb early; go dumb often.” This is just a hint of what it to come.
This happens because the wingnuts vote in droves!!! If the majority of the public would get out to vote, these people would not be in any leadership positions!!!
The people who actively organize and consistently vote are the ones who have the greater say. Isn’t that how the process is meant to work?
Doeden is an antisemite and people who endorse him are too. Does Lance stand by Doeden’s claim that acts of antisemitism didn’t increase after the October 7th attack and that the reports of increased antisemitic attacks are false?
That alleged “conservative” wing of the SDGOP is sweatin’ bullets now. B**t hole is really starting to pucker
Tobes is using the same used car lazy tactics running for Governor creating a problem that only he can fix along with all kinds of claims of fixing problems that do not exist or are greatly exaggerated to make the sale. It’s like coming in on a tight budget looking for a truck to pull a gooseneck stock trailer which should spec wise need a 1 ton dually. Toby would in my opinion sell the customer a 1/2 ton pickup and claim it would do the job and get also get good gas mileage pulling that stock trailer in order to make a sale. Customer believing Tobes would not only be unsafe pulling that stock trailer with a 1/2 ton but wear that pickup out in not time aside from not getting the gas mileage as promised. That 1/2 ton will end up sitting in a yard with weeds growing around it and the poor owner is upside down on a loan still making payments on a vehicle they cannot use.
If he somehow fools everyone and wins the election how will Governor Doeden spend his time? Rather than the hard, long hours and tedious work of governing which is beyond his interest and intellectual capability. I’d wager he will look for ways he can personally profit from public office and do what in my opinion he really enjoys which is being a bully. He will pick fights with Minnesota and our other neighboring states. It will be non-stop culture wars and going after anyone who opposes or disagrees with him.
South Dakota companies, hospitals and universities already having serious problems recruiting and retaining employees from out of state will have an even more difficult time. Universities and trade schools same similar issues.
Brain drain will accelerate at an even faster pace.
The state economy and opportunities decline. Taxes and other living costs increase, nursing homes close, businesses close and citizens realize they made a big mistake at the ballot box.
I truly wish that every Republican would read the comments of DWC and educate themselves about who Doe Doe truly is. Unfortunately, they will not. Unfortunately, our state is screwed. Calling it now. But would love to be proven wrong. And Katie, thank you for doing the Lord’s work on this.
we can get out the votes of our independent friends; urge them to change their voter registrations to Republican so they can vote on the 28th
SD “publicans got rid of the loyal opposition Demos. Now they have the disloyal MAGA opposition. Ya reap whatcha sow
Need to do away with voting at Convention. The wing-nuts have continuously added more and more precinct people each convention and out vote the rest of us.
If we can’t get these races moved to a statewide primary ballot, we need to get rid of the precinct committee people, especially those who come from counties which do not have party committees, and those who only show up on the last day for free.
It’s a big red flag when a county delegation consists solely of precinct committee people, none of whom can be bothered to organize a county party and serve as a county party chairman. Since the precinct committee people serve under the direction of the county chair, if nobody wants that job, why do the precinct positions exist?
Obviously they are not interested in building the party.
Another lame argument is against charging any of them a convention fee if they only show up on Saturday to vote. They don’t participate in any of the convention’s fund-raising activities. The argument is “you can’t charge people to vote.” But it is the counties which vote, not the individuals in the delegation. It takes only one delegate to cast all of a county’s votes. So that delegate, the chairman or vice chair of the county party, should be allowed to attend for free, all others should pay. People who want to build the party should WANT to help defray the cost of the convention; it’s a red flag when they don’t.
So you hate being called a REPUBLIC where the voters have the chance to organize, nominate, and elect Precinct Committeemen and Women that represent them under each of the counties, further represent them as a State. I think you butt hurt progressive, social Republicans otherwise known as Neocons, hate is the fact you lost control of the state, cause the people have turned on your progressive policies to which hurt the state. Your push to increase taxes, cause the fact you people doubled the size of our budget in less than 5 years. I can see why the people of the Republican party chosen to organize behind a grassroots, patriot, freedom loving movement more than a decade ago. Stop whining, you Neocons had your 20 years (1997-2017), you screwed up our beloved Republic, and the people rose up and took control of the party, aligning themselves with the Patriots, the Military, and Donald Trump aka M.A.G.A. So now, you like Katie “Big Bitch” Hoffman, and Pat are crying all cause you have lost your power. You have a lot of nerve. Take a Hike. Doeden is now the leader of the S.D M.A.G.A Party today.
This is just more ammo to move all statewide offices to the primary ballot
So you hate Article 26 of the constitution?
DOEDEN CAMPAIGN SUMMARY: Trump made promises. Trump won. If I make promises too then I win too! The People are mine!
You people are pathetic, sore losers who want to change the rules cause you cannot control what the people want today.
So you hate being called a REPUBLIC where the voters have the chance to organize, nominate, and elect Precinct Committeemen and Women that represent them under each of the counties, further represent them as a State. I think you butt hurt progressive, social Republicans otherwise known as Neocons, hate is the fact you lost control of the state, cause the people have turned on your progressive policies to which hurt the state. Your push to increase taxes, cause the fact you people doubled the size of our budget in less than 5 years. I can see why the people of the Republican party chosen to organize behind a grassroots, patriot, freedom loving movement more than a decade ago. Stop whining, you Neocons had your 20 years (1997-2017), you screwed up our beloved Republic, and the people rose up and took control of the party, aligning themselves with the Patriots, the Military, and Donald Trump aka M.A.G.A. So now, you like Katie “Big Bitch” Hoffman, and Pat are crying all cause you have lost your power. You have a lot of nerve. Take a Hike. Doeden is now the leader of the S.D M.A.G.A Party today.
The fact is, the Department of Social Services has become our most corrupted department today, stealing our social security, Medicare, Medicaid thanks to your believed Neocons of the late 90’s who agreed with Bill Clinton to place social security into our general fund, only to pass the 1997 Safe Family and Children Act, allowing C.P.S to traffic more children, placing them into Foster Care in the name of preemptive surveillance, Then you stole more of our rights by working with George Bush to pass the Patriot Act, Real I.D Act, and then worked with Obama to pass the Affordable Care Act which further stole our social security, medicare, and Medicaid further trafficking more children, expanding the welfare state. All this fraud, has led to exposing the childcare fraud, transportation fraud, hospice fraud, let alone voting fraud. All things pushed heavily by the Democrat party in conjunction with the Neocons. Is this what your New American Century was all about? Bankrupting America? Be careful man, John Thune may end up in Gitmo for treason pretty soon.
The GOP establishment in South Dakota HATES the people who make up its electorate.
GOP Politicians regularly call their voters WING-NUTS and refer to them as the CRAZY CREW.
The disparate votes for Haugaard for Governor in the ’22 primary and for LG at the convention were evidence enough that the delegates to the conventions are not representative of their electorate.
Few precinct committee men and women are elected by anybody, they sign up, “run” unopposed, and their names never appear on a primary ballot. The voters in their precincts have no idea these people are representing them, or what they do when they get to conventions. And since most precinct committee men and women crawl back under whatever rock they were hiding under and never do their job, there is no transparency, no accountability, for what happened at convention. Most of the people who will vote in November have no idea how these candidates were nominated.
Moving all statewide offices to the primary ballot would solve this problem and return the power to the electorate.
You are not a true supporter of a free republic. You want a democracy. You are what is wrong with this country. You fail to understand what it means to be a Republic. I wish we go back to the time where we managed this Country as under the Articles of Confederation, the purest form of a Republic. Patrick Henry was right in 1788, he smelled a fox, British Loyalists conspired to ruin our free States, and formed a federal, British Territory that now rules over us. I now believe you neocons are British Citizens who hate America, and wish to turn us into a feudal society, a full democracy. You are a loser just like Katie “Big Bitch” Hoffman.
Where are the sources ShadGPT?
Because they are. And in no way do they represent the overall sentiment of the Republican Party in SD.
If you are a precinct committeeman you need to stop ranting because you have a lot to do this weekend.
You have to put on a Rounds or Jackley t-shirt and walk in parades, attend picnics and fireworks, wearing those shirts
For years I did three parades on the 4th, traveling hundreds of miles at top speed just to line up in time, and since it is usually hot, sweaty shirts can be changed between towns.
Nobody cares if you voted for Rounds or Jackley in the primary, your job is to show up wearing their t-shirts now.
That is the job you signed up for. Now shut up and get to work.