Former Democrat State Senate candidate and South Dakota’s most liberal man, Cory Heidelberger was busy trying to play “gotcha” today with State Senator Deb Soholt by publicizing a voter registration form he was sent by an unidentified source which shows that Deb Soholt supposedly removed her party identification from her voter registration on December 9th of last yeay, changing it from “Republican” to “No Party.”
In fact, all of this information was sent to Heidelberger prior to any publicity elsewhere, as this new scorecard has yet to be linked to the Citizens for Liberty website.* It certainly says something when they’re rushing to provide it to Democrats before any other media source.
A few people in Republican circles were confused, not the least of which was Soholt herself, who found herself questioning whether this was an error, or some sort of fraudulent submission, which would have been a criminal act along the lines of Annette Bosworth’s legal woes.
As she spent the morning digging into where this came from, it didn’t take long to track it down. According to a statement issued today:
Today a press release from Citizens for Liberty showed that Senator Deb Soholt, District 14, was not registered as a Republican.
This was a complete surprise and after investigating the source document from 12.9.16, she found it was the day at the Department of Motor Vehicles getting a new driver’s license after having lost her wallet in DC. When the renewal kiosk auto-filled her information, she missed the open box for “party” before signing.
The truth of the matter is that Senator Soholt has been a Republican since becoming a registered voter at the age of 18 – except for this human error.
While one might question the motivation of Citizens for Liberty in taking the time to request source voter documents at county auditor offices, Senator Soholt is grateful to know her mistake so she can get back to being the formally registered Republican that she has been for a lifetime.
In a nutshell, she had lost her wallet while on a trip, came back, and was at a drivers’ license kiosk or station to get new one. And when she obtained her new license, there was a box she didn’t check off and it blanked out her voter registration.
If it shows anything, it shows she’s as human and able to have headaches with technology as the rest of us. And it might be something the driver’s license people need to double check to make sure they review what fields are checked when replacement licenses are issued.
What catches my attention a bit more closely is that was sent to liberal democrats as part of the Citizens for Liberty campaign piece, where they note that some legislators were registered under different party affiliations. In some cases, they had changed parties up to 20-30 years previous.
Seriously.. Such as in the case of Larry Rhoden, who had originally registered as a Democrat when he first registered to vote as a youth, and changed parties in the 1990s. Yet, Citizens for Liberty are trying to use that in conjunction with his “rating.”
What some of us may call education and personal growth when people change from Democrat to Republican, they try to portray as heresy.
What is interesting is that someone took the time to contact the appropriate county auditors to ask about and obtain documentation of previous political registrations. Because it’s not on-line. It’s not part of an electronic record. You have to have county auditors physically look it up, and in some cases, via an ancient card catalog.
That’s not part of a “voter scorecard” for tallying how they voted. That’s purely opposition research for election campaign purposes, and it looks like they conducted it on all Republican legislators.
This past election, there were a number of primary elections where those affiliated with hard right groups such as Citizens for Liberty made a number of primary election challenges against legislators such as Senator Terri Haverly, then Representative Jeff Partridge, Senator Alan Solano, and others, most of whom had strongly conservative credentials such as with the American Conservative Union, the National Rifle Association, etc. Yet, that didn’t stop their challengers from trying to paint them as liberal as they campaigned against them.
If this episode does anything, it should be forewarning that certain groups are out to replace conservative Republican legislators with their own people. They’re doing their research, and they’re going to go after Republicans twice as hard as they did before.
And noting that they’re happy to pass the information on to the most liberal of Democrats, it also shows that it’s not about political party, or what they believe. There’s an often used saying about the problem lying down with dogs. It’s hard to proclaim your ideological purity when you spend most of your time laying with flea-bitten donkeys.
I think the moral of today’s tale is more properly “Be careful what box you check at the DMV, and of scorecards that come with daggers.” Because both could come back at a later date.
* Here’s a screenshot of the website taken at 12:30 today.
The “2017 SOUTH DAKOTA SENATE CONSERVATIVE SCORECARD” sent to Democrats is not linked or posted…
What a group….they issue a scorecard and then re-issue it????
Sounds like they are trying to tweak the outcome….Most credible groups let the members know which bills will be scored BEFORE they are voted on not cherry picked after the fact!
I don’t want to discount the political ramifications of what you wrote but think about it:
Somebody who is an elected member of the GOP caucus comes up as having re-registered without a public statement (ala Mike Huether) and it is treated as something significant without so much as a phone call.
It reminds me of the time I’m playing a friendly game of golf with someone for a few bucks. He asks me to move my ball (ok under the rules) and I forget to move it back. As soon as I strike my ball, he yells “penalty.” In other words, he was waiting for me to do it. I looked at him with disdain, accepted the consequences, paid a few bucks on the 18th green, and never played with him again.
Technically is she a registered Independent. Yep. Did she intend to re-register? Nope. Is in a chance for a cheap shot? Yep.
This group obviously has the integrity and decency of a cad. They can have their ratings. Scumbags can hang together.
If you look at their own scorecard they say 80% are friends and allies…the rest are apparently not pure enough…So by their own card only 3 senators and 8 representatives are pure enough for them. 11/105 mind you….10.4% agree with them enough….you be the judge, here they are….
Stace Nelson, Lance Russell and Phil Jensen
Julie Frye Muller, Dan Kaiser, Drew Dennert, Chip Campbell, Steve Livermont, Lynne DiSanto, Sam Marty, Elizabeth May
there’s a braintrust
That person is an idiot. They should have told you, let you four putt and won with a clean conscience.
That was for Troy PP. I apparently replied to wrong post. Now who is an idiot.
PS. Jones still can’t putt. 😉
I have chip yips not putting yips. I am offended you put me in the crowd of bad putters. I stand alone as a chipper. Sheesh.
As it sucks to loose one’s wallet and deal with the issues that pursue, maybe Soholt changing party affiliation from Rep to Indy would be more appropriate considering her voting record.
Soholt is a Republican legislator that has a 100% rating from NARAL and given a 50% rating from SD Right to Life. She is a “conservative Republican” that voted Nay on a bill that would prohibit abortions after 22wks. Didn’t the House just pass the Pain Capable Bill? Oh, and not to mention over the course of 5+ years living in District 14, not once has she come to our neighborhood.
Just want to make sure we’re talking about the same “conservative Republican” the Citizens for Liberty is possibly trying to replace.
I’ll take Sen. Soholt at her word that she didn’t intentionally switch from Republican to Independent. The moral of this story is that signing a document without reading it is foolish at the very least, and you may end up looking foolish if somebody finds out that you signed a document without reading it.
As I understand it, it was a kiosk screen, as opposed to a document. Depends how it was laid out. My dad tried getting his car license renewed at a kiosk, and couldn’t get it work to save his life. Sometimes, technology is not as efficient to some people as much as it it is to others.
Serving in the Legislature really can’t be called a good time but neither should it be labeled as a personally threatening job. What it should be is a working culture of individual respect and 24/7 Statesmanship in all personal and public matters.
But I guess we have our own kneelers here who disrespect the incredible position of responsibility every legislator has to his or her constituents and the rule of law. By doing so these self made purists are in effect cornering themselves in the lowest position of power among all 105. Incredibly so.