Author: @SoDakCampaigns

Showing Up to Work
By Sen. John Thune

For the last few months, essential employees across the country have been showing up for work, often risking their health and safety when they do. We’ve all heard harrowing stories of doctors, nurses, and other health care professionals who’ve spent weeks away from home so they could help treat patients and comfort families, sacrificing time away from their own.

We’ve also heard stories and seen the realities of other heroes who, up until the pandemic, have all been members of the unsung variety: delivery drivers, sanitation workers, grocery store workers, and cable and utility technicians, just to name a few. They’re the people we often took for granted on trash day or after placing an Amazon order or when we made a trip down the meat or dairy aisle. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ll ever look at a fully stocked grocery store the same way ever again.

Essential workers have helped keep America running, and during a crisis, Congress is an essential industry.

At the height of the pandemic, after Congress passed a massive, multi-trillion dollar coronavirus relief package, the Senate practiced what it was preaching. We spent a few weeks working from our home states to help reduce the risk of spreading the disease. Our top priority was – and is – keeping people safe. During that time, the attending physician and others at the Capitol worked hard to develop a plan for the Senate to safely return to Washington as soon as possible, and we did on May 4.

We’ve been hard at work monitoring the $2.4 trillion comprehensive response to the coronavirus pandemic, convening important committee hearings to conduct oversight and prepare legislation for future floor consideration, and walking and chewing gum by passing bills and confirming executive and judicial branch nominees.

I’ve participated in several Commerce Committee hearings that have examined how the coronavirus crisis has affected transportation in the United States – a critical industry for South Dakota. The committee heard directly from the airline, automotive, and railroad industries about how they’ve dealt with the pandemic and how they’re planning to be part of the reopening. The Commerce Committee has also examined the heightened reliance of broadband – another critical issue in South Dakota – particularly the dependence on keeping America connected over the last few months. And the Finance Committee, of which I’m also a member, has convened hearings to examine unemployment insurance during the pandemic and conduct oversight of certain Food and Drug Administration inspection processes.

As the economy continues to reopen in South Dakota and around the country, the Senate is going to continue to focus on those buckets: monitoring COVID relief efforts, convening hearings and conducting oversight, and passing bills and confirming nominees. All of them are important to our state’s and nation’s recovery and reopening.

This has been a difficult year. I know it feels like there have been more downs than ups. I think it has highlighted, though, that while our individual struggles might be unique, so too is our shared optimism that tomorrow will be better than today. Despite any obstacles we find in our way, we still wake up every morning in the greatest country the world has ever known. We are American together, and that’s why brighter days are always ahead.

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Strengthening our Armed Forces
By U.S. Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.)

The United States military is the best in the world. Our all-volunteer force is made up of men and women from different backgrounds and different states, but what they all have in common is a love of country and a desire to serve. We are eternally grateful to them—and their families—for the incredible sacrifices they make to protect our freedoms. One way we can show our thanks is by making sure they have the tools and resources necessary to do their job. In Congress, we do this by passing a National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) each year.

The Senate Armed Services Committee, which I’ve worked on since coming to the Senate in 2015, recently voted to approve the NDAA for fiscal year 2021. It will be debated by the full Senate before we vote on final passage. Our committee put in a lot of work this year on the NDAA and I’m pleased that we were once again able to pass it with strong bipartisan support. In fact, this will be the 60th consecutive year that we will have passed a widely-supported NDAA.

As our near-peer competitors, like China and Russia, continue to grow their own militaries, it’s critically important that the U.S. makes sure our troops have better weapons systems, better tools and more resources than our adversaries. We never want to send our men and women into a fair fight—we always want them to have the advantage. The NDAA authorizes Department of Defense (DoD) programs and provides defense policy to make sure the United States maintains irreversible momentum when it comes to implementing the National Defense Strategy. The National Defense Strategy provides clear direction for restoring our military’s competitive edge in an era of re-emerging, long-term great power competition. The B-21 Raider bombers coming to Ellsworth Air Force Base in the near future are a part of this long-term National Defense Strategy. As I said earlier, we have the best armed forces in the world, but we need to make sure we remain the best well into the future.

One of the ways we can do this is by improving the way the DoD hires personnel. The NDAA includes language to improve recruitment and retention efforts to maintain the force, while also offering more flexibility to hire civilian talent. In particular, the DoD needs highly-skilled, brilliant cybersecurity professionals to help improve the cybersecurity efforts of our armed forces. In some cases, the most qualified cyber personnel could be private sector cybersecurity personnel serving in the National Guard or Reserve. Dakota State University (DSU) in Madison has been at the forefront of cyber-related research for years. As a National Security Agency and Department of Homeland Security Center of Academic Excellence, DSU is preparing its students for government careers in cybersecurity.

Just like the FY 2020 NDAA, this one includes a pay raise for our troops. Military families are recognized in the NDAA as well—we’ve included language to increase access to high-quality child care for military families and to improve military housing. When a husband or wife is deployed, the last thing we want is for spouses to have to worry about home repair issues or finding a good daycare for their kids when they’re at work.

The men and women who wear the uniform of the United States put their lives on the line to protect and preserve our freedom. We’re forever grateful to them for their service and sacrifice. Passing the NDAA each year is one way for us to make sure they and their families are taken care of and have all the resources they need as they serve our nation.

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Called to Serve
by Rep. Dusty Johnson

Many may not know that Members of Congress are able to nominate students to our nation’s military academies. It’s a real opportunity to ensure South Dakota values help shape military decisions – and it’s also a real opportunity to make sure the military looks like the American people it’s responsible to defend.

Saying it is an honor to nominate students from across our great state to serve our nation doesn’t do the moment justice. These are not ordinary high school graduates. Some grew up knowing they were interested in attending an academy, some grew up in a family with a long line of military service and some have no family military history at all. But what they do have in common is a good moral character, their commitment to our nation’s defense and selfless bravery and courage. They all feel called to serve their country.

Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to organize a virtual academy reception for some of the students my office nominated. June is quite a transition month for these soon-to-be Cadets and Midshipmen. These students will head to their respective academies in late June and early July – surrendering civilian clothing and belongings (even their cell phones!) – and begin their military training. You can imagine this is also a transition month for their parents as well – who may only speak with their son or daughter three times throughout the summer. Very different than a traditional college drop-off.

It’s hard from Day One for a reason. It’s hard because these Cadets and Midshipmen will commission as military officers at graduation. It’s hard because when called to lead soldiers, airmen, sailors, or Marines, these young Americans will rely on the skills and training gained from experience at the academies. It’s hard because the United States is home to the mightiest military in the world, due in no small part to the dedicated young men and women who serve.

While we wish the 2024 service academy class godspeed, we also look ahead to the next round of nominations. Our office is currently accepting applications for nominations to the U.S. Military Academy, the U.S. Naval Academy, the U.S. Air Force Academy and the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy until Friday, October 30. Visit my website or call one of my offices if you are interested in learning more about the nomination process.

I look at my three sons and I don’t know what the future has in store for them. I don’t know if they’ll choose to serve in the military like their grandfather, if they’ll choose a liberal arts degree, or if they’ll choose to pursue a technical trade. What I do know is my conversations with these academy candidates has helped shape who I want to be as a parent and what values I want to instill in my children as they grow older.

Pictured (from left to right):
Row 1: Ethan Wipf – Air Force Academy; Rep. Dusty Johnson; Enoch Crow – Military Academy at West Point
Row 2: Julia Lair – Naval Academy; Chelsea Schull – Office of Rep. Johnson; Madeline Loewe – Naval Academy
Row 3: Amber Kelly – Naval Academy Prep School; Pierce Okken – Air Force Academy; Katie Murray – Office of Rep. Dusty Johnson
Row 4: Ellie Abraham – Naval Academy; Caden Tegethoff – Northwestern Preparatory School

Not Pictured:
Max Martin – Military Academy at West Point
Isaac Buchholtz – Military Academy at West Point
Zachary Curd – Air Force Academy

Lessons Learned from COVID-19
By Governor Kristi Noem 

COVID-19 has given us many unique challenges. As I’ve repeatedly said, this situation is historic in the worst way. But with every challenge comes the opportunity to learn, to adapt, and to improve. Today, I’d like to outline some of the lessons we’ve learned.

Perhaps the most significant take away so far is that more freedom, not more government, is the answer. Freedom alone won’t solve all our problems, but it presents a better path towards where we want to go.

Freedom is a better friend of true science than government-controlled science. Freedom the best friend of innovation. Freedom focuses our politics on persuasion and the intellectual strength of our positions, not on control, coercion or the heavy hand of government. And if someone is interested in the common good in all its iterations and complexities, freedom is the one and only choice.

Another lesson we learned pertains to modeling. While modeling certainly has a place, models have two major shortcomings: no model can actually predict the future, especially when it is based on data that is incomplete; and, no model is capable of replacing human freedom as the best path to responding to life’s risks, including this virus.

In South Dakota, we saw modeling as a tool, and we used it to be prepared for a worst-case scenario. I thank God that the worst-case hasn’t happened, but we were ready – and we are still ready – if it does. But there is no model that can take into consideration all the factors that make real life work. A blind reliance on insufficient modeling has led some politicians to institute disastrous lockdowns, but South Dakota took a different path.

Another lesson: urban life isn’t necessarily all that it’s cracked up to be. In South Dakota, the rural life is often a preferred way of life. Folks want to stay on the land their grandfathers and grandmothers once farmed. They want to stay in the communities they have called home for generations. They want to eat in small mom and pop restaurants, visit some of the world’s most beautiful places and have their kids spend time with a tackle box rather than an Xbox.

Sure, big, famous cities like New York are home to some iconic buildings and some great museums. But they come with traffic, noise, and plenty of sanitation issues. And as we’ve seen throughout this pandemic, population density comes with a steep cost.

Some think COVID-19 will accelerate the move of people out of cities. That story is still being written, but one of the few things we know about this virus is that density is one of the key factors contributing to its spread. Because of that, New York and Silicon Valley may look very different in the future.

But the lessons from this virus don’t stop at city limits. Our trips to the store might look different.  Our sporting events might change.  I was in a meeting just recently about our State Fair – it’s going to change too.  But that’s not a bad thing. It’s a chance to innovate and get creative.

Our new normal may be very different from the past, but don’t ever forget this one fundamental truth: the windshield is so much bigger than the rearview mirror for a reason. In South Dakota, we always confront adversity and emerge into even greater prosperity. Our future is bright. Hope is in front of us. We will come out stronger than ever before.

This column is an abbreviated version of a speech given by Governor Noem. You can view the full speech here.

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The dust has nearly settled on a close Sioux Falls City Council race, and nothing left but a few ministerial items, including a likely recount that has enough daylight between the victor and the vanquished that – absent a grievous and previously undiscovered error – there’s no chance the result is going to change.

The successful candidate in the contest, Alex Jensen, has issued a press release thanking his supporters and his opponent in the contest, Theresa Stehly.

As for Theresa… well, let’s just say she seems to be handling it a bit differently:

For three days this past week, Stehly seems to have had a bit of an issue with the State GOP, posting the same thing over and over. What was their alleged crime triggering her to angrily invoke them in her post-loss pity party?

In the Sioux Falls City Election, the SDGOP put out a Sioux Falls Election circular discussing the major races taking place n the Sioux Falls area where the party now has their headquarters. And the unspeakable crime in Theresa’s mind that that they committed was that it published several paragraphs discussing the race that Stehly was involved in. In part:

Stehly’s entrance into the race was not immediate; she announced her re-election campaign several months after her opponent Alex Jensen made note of his interest in the race.

During her 2020 campaign for reelection, Stehly has claimed, “I will be running a positive, grassroots campaign, continuing my emphasis on citizen advocacy and focusing on the issues,” she said in a statement.”

and..

Councilor Stehly noted that “she continues to be focused on government transparency, accountability in city spending, strengthening the police force, supporting neighborhood safety and integrity, improving responsiveness to citizen concerns and maintaining municipal infrastructure.”

However, Stehly is known as being contentious when she is confronted about issues, as well as being entangled in controversy, such as incidents earlier this year where several newspaper stories ran about the councilwoman undertaking a robocall campaign against a prospective city department hire, and blocking people on social media. Some users said “they got the cold social media shoulder from Stehly because they don’t see eye-to-eye with her politically.”

Stehly’s conduct on the Sioux Falls City Council is well-documented, and has often been the subject of news stories and editorials in the Sioux Falls media, so it’s hard for Stehly to claim that anyone writing a story about her noting her positive points and things she’s campaigned on, along with a light treatment of some of her controversies is doing so in anger.

If anything, it skipped over quite a bit. While it noted recent controversies on her robocall campaign against a hiring, and her blocking of people on social media, you didn’t see any mention of her attacking a private citizen from the podium in January, and demanding the censorship of a news article. Didn’t mention her falsely accusing her colleagues of corruption. It doesn’t mention accusations of misinformation during the tornado, misinformation on sewer service, attacking a potential city hire for disagreeing with her on social media, pushing to expand video lottery, or attacking Kristi Noem over the President Trump Visit to Sioux Falls…  (And I know I’m missing a few things).

So there’s allegedly anger or hatred when the GOP sends out an election guide that notes on one hand that Theresa states she “will be running a positive, grassroots campaign,”  but on the other acknowledges that she’s “entangled in controversy?”  I don’t think so.  They’re all stories about her that are all pretty recent, and well documented.

If there’s any anger or hatred involved in the election, it seems to be the fact that Theresa is angry that people’s memories are not as short as she’d like them to be, and the article was attempting to be honest, without piling on.

“Isn’t it true that housekeeping is woman’s business and that her success depends not only on herself but on the way her town is governed?”

I’d wager my wife and daughters might pelt me with large objects if I declared that statement to them today. But that was part of the South Dakota Votes for Women campaign in 1916.

As a political collector, lately I’ve found that suffrage items are in demand and particularly tough to buy this year, with 2020 being the 100th Anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment.  So I thought myself particularly fortunate yesterday to find someone selling some great South Dakota specific suffrage flyers on-line, and bought one of each.

The flyers from the South Dakota Universal Franchise League of Huron made the case to the men of South Dakota why women should be granted the vote.. which might seem a little sexist nowadays.. but that’s who was voting!

With the election on November 7th, that dates the flyers as having been issued for the 1916 election, which was the final election in which the Suffragist and Prohibitionist campaigns were linked together, as prohibition passed.. but not suffrage.

Great items from over 100 years ago here in South Dakota!

The Argus filed a boring, predictable story yesterday on the elections. Even worse, this was a “subscriber only” story, so they’re posting on their main page that if you want to read it, you have to pay for it.  (No switching your web browsers to private mode and reading it that way, you newspaper pirates!)

The lede for the story is as follows….

A wave of new Republican legislators will be headed to Pierre next year, with multiple incumbents already removed through the primary election process. And the Democrats are looking to build on their current super-minority status this November election.

Read that here.

And that’s supposed to set the tone for this story. …I guess.

I suppose you could say “multiple incumbents already removed through the primary process.” While it was the introduction of the article and was supposed to grab us, Argus political reporter Lisa Kaczke managed to muddy up the actual details.

Nine Republican legislators lost their primary election, and combined with a dozen races without a Republican incumbent, these elections could pave the way for a new group of Republicans at the Capitol.

The Republican candidate cohort includes Erin Tobin, a nurse practitioner who defeated House Majority Leader Lee Qualm by a large margin in Senate District 21, Jessica Bahmuller, the daughter of Rep. Arch Beal who had a narrow victory over Rep. Marty Overweg in House District 19, and former legislator Dean Wink, who led in the House District 29 race that saw the defeat of Rep. Thomas Brunner.

“Multiple incumbents removed?”  Well, yes, but…

Kaczke did manage to describe the D19 race accurately, as well as the D29 race. But she drops the ball when she completely ignores the other races where an incumbent lost, the District 7 race in Brookings where State Rep. Doug Post was odd-man out when Larry Tidemann decided to make a comeback, and Tim Reed held his seat.  And then we hears nothing about Gubernatorial appointee JD Wangsness being beat out in D23 House, nor Gubernatorial appointee Dayle Hammock in D31 House.

Yes, there were other elections such as the Otten/Latterell, Rusch/Rassmussen & Qualm/Tobin races where current lawmakers were involved – but the ones who lost were termed out of their current office, and lost the race for the new office they were seeking.

Tobin and Qualm were competing for an open seat – so there was no actual incumbent there.  I mean, if someone is a Congressman running for the US Senate, we don’t call them “incumbent.”  That’s just sloppy.  I mean, if your premise is claiming that multiple incumbents were removed, you could probably use the ones who lost as examples instead of including a race where that didn’t happen.

For incumbents, it doesn’t seem as a major overthrow when you look in it at that context. It just seems more like the circumstance of a narrow loss, a couple of campaign vets returning, and you have appointees who don’t have the experience of running a legislative race before. (As I’ve written about in the past, historically they lose at least 50% of the time.)

If you look at the title ascribed to the article “Party dynamics, changes to status quo in play for South Dakota Legislature in 2021,” Having done work for a number of  campaigns this primary season, I’d tell you that a concept such as ‘party dynamics’ had nothing to do with the results of the primary elections.

So many of the people who won did it through coalition building, their own hard work, and sheer will.  If that’s the change they’ll be bringing to the legislature in 2021, South Dakota will be in good hands, indeed.

I will say there was one quote in the article that was amusing. Maybe not $32-a-month-for-Argus-on-line-access funny, but it still made me laugh, which came from Democrat Executive Director & former State Rep. Pam Merchant (now Pam Cole) describing her efforts with the Democrat Party:

We’re pacing ourselves with our party and building a bench over time.

Read that here.

Democrats are “pacing” themselves with their party and “building a bench over time?”  Is that what you call it?

(OK. Maybe that was worth the $32 this month. That’s really funny.)

In case you wanted to read the story from the SDGOP Newsletter about the 11 women who are helping to lead the SDGOP to victory this fall, the Republican Party has made it available on facebook:

Thune Introduces Bill to Support Hand Sanitizer and Ethanol Production By Extending FDA Guidance

“American ethanol producers stand ready to help America get through these tough times.”

Click here or on the picture above to watch Thune discuss his bill on the Senate floor.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) today introduced legislation that would extend for two years The Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) “Temporary Policy for Preparation of Certain Alcohol-Based Hand Sanitizer Products During the Public Health Emergency.” Extending the FDA’s guidance will grant additional certainty for ethanol operations that have made investments or changes in operations to serve the current and projected need for hand sanitizer, providing a longer timeline to recoup such costs. Importantly, this will support continued production of ethanol for hand sanitizer at a time of high demand and reported shortages to help reduce the transmission of COVID-19.

“The COVID-19 health pandemic has hit a wide spectrum of industries in our economy – including biofuels, as the demand for fuel has gone down,” said Thune. “While I recognize the amount of ethanol required for hand sanitizer will be a drop in the bucket for our ethanol producers, every bit helps, and American ethanol producers stand ready to help America get through these tough times.”

“ACE thanks Senator Thune for introducing legislation to provide greater certainty to ethanol producers about the investments they have made to respond to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic by supplying alcohol for sanitizer,” said Brian Jennings, CEO of the American Coalition for Ethanol. “Sanitizer production has helped keep some plants open and their workers employed during this downturn, all the while keeping their communities safer. Producers need some level of certainty that they won’t be inflicted with more regulatory whiplash after spending precious capital to retool their plants to provide sanitizer as Americans begin to slowly return to their normal activities.”

“Biotechnology has enabled the sustainable fuels industry to step up in the fight to protect the public against COVID-19 by repurposing their facilities to produce hand sanitizer,” said Stephanie Batchelor, vice president of BIO’s industrial and environmental section. “BIO thanks Senator Thune for introducing legislation to provide regulatory certainty to producers who have made the investment to help combat this disease.”

This legislation is cosponsored by Sens. Mike Braun (R-Ind.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and Mike Rounds (R-S.D.).

Here’s a hot tip that I received this morning.  Remember my post a couple of months back about former candidate and Dem party staffer Aaron Matson doing work for the Ahlers campaign at the same time he was a federal census employee?

I’m told that Matson has supposedly resigned from his federal government position “and will be heading up Dan Ahlers’ campaign.”

(If correct) we’ll see what skills and insight he has to bring to the Ahlers campaign.

In Matson’s last go around as a statewide candidate.. you might say that there was some room for improvement:

Maybe working together with Ahlers, he can help the Democrat candidate for US Senate break 38%.