“Senator McConnell’s legacy is one of remarkable service to the Senate, the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and our nation.”
WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) today released the following statement:
“Senator McConnell’s legacy is one of remarkable service to the Senate, the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and our nation,” said Thune. “Over decades of tireless work, his mastery of Senate procedure, commitment to the institution, and dedication to the rule of law have shaped the course of American governance for generations to come. His leadership has strengthened the Senate’s role as a deliberative body and delivered historic achievements, from advancing the judiciary to championing Kentucky’s interests. Senator McConnell’s contributions will remain a lasting reflection of his steady vision, determination, and service to the country he loves.”
Had a reader send this to me, as they believe this is where Bethany Soye got her inspiration for HB 1239, her librarian lock-up bill that proposes to send librarians, teachers, and museum workers to jail because someone doesn’t like a book that has been checked out:
Remember the vote is this afternoon on this ridiculousness – call your legislators .
Great Job on Fox yesterday by Senate Majority Leader John Thune in explaining how far Republican Senators have come, in working with Speaker Johnson and the Republican House, on TAX CUTS, THE BORDER, and some of the most important legislation that our Country has ever considered.…
Someone get a victim doll. Because we have book-burning legislators who need to show us on the doll where the words hurt them. And even better, in a show of the continuing ridiculousness that the 100th legislative session has become, some legislators now want to walk school librarians out of public schools in handcuffs because material slipped in that they found objectionable, according to testimony on House Bill 1239.
A South Dakota legislative committee advanced a bill Wednesday at the Capitol in Pierre that would subject schools, universities, museums, libraries and their employees to criminal prosecution and jail time for allowing children to view material defined in state law as obscene or harmful to minors.
An opponent of the bill said it would put “librarians in handcuffs” for lending a book to a child that some adults might consider inappropriate. One member of the House Education Committee who voted in favor of the legislation, Rep. Travis Ismay, R-Newell, suggested an arrest might be insufficient punishment.
“If a librarian rented this out to my son or daughter, you’d be lucky if you got hauled out of there in handcuffs,” Ismay said. “So, yes, if they’re breaking the law anyway, why would we have any problem with librarians getting hauled out of the library in handcuffs?”
Representative Travis Ismay, who celebrates “White History Month” (not kidding) intimates that an arrest might not be good enough for a librarian who checks out a book with thoughts he objects to. Why? Because parents are incapable of being parents, and legislators feel the need to substitute laws for parenting because that’s the legislature’s job?
What happened? Honestly, at what point did the nanny-state envisioned by legislators become such a stifling, choking parental substitute that they insist it invade every aspect of what a parent should be doing when it comes to their kids? No where is there a better example of this than in House Bill 1239 where we have actual elected legislators – completely illiterate morons, but elected legislators – intimating that arrest might not be good enough for a librarian who checked out a book with a passage they objected to.
House Bill 1239, where Representative Travis Ismay suggested “you’d be lucky if you got hauled out of there in handcuffs” is scheduled to be heard on the House floor today. Call your legislator, or e-mail your legislator, and tell them to kill the embarrassing HB 1239.
And while you’re at it, tell them to knock off the threats to arrest school librarians, or to flog librarians in the public square, or whatever this ridiculousness is that the book burners are proposing.
Senator Mike Rounds Weekly Round[s] Up: February 10-16, 2025
Welcome back to another Weekly Round[s] Up! We’re continuing to confirm President Trump’s nominees at a record pace here in the Senate. We now have 18 in place, including Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence, whose swearing-in ceremony I attended this week at the White House. As we vote on nominees, we continue with our regular business in the Senate like meetings with South Dakotans, hearings and classified briefings. I also introduced legislation this past week to create more oversight of the bureaucracy. More on all of this in my Weekly Round[s] Up:
South Dakotans I met with: Leaders from the Oglala Sioux Tribe, the Rosebud Sioux Tribe and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe; Dr. Troy Meink, nominee to serve as Secretary of the Air Force, who is originally from Lemmon and graduated from South Dakota State University (Go Jacks!); representatives from the South Dakota chapter of the National Federation of Independent Business; physicians from the South Dakota State Medical Association; leaders from Black Hills Area Habitat for Humanity; and members of South Dakota Civil Air Patrol.
South Dakota towns represented: Brookings, Eagle Butte, Hermosa, Lemmon, Madison, Mission, Pierre, Pine Ridge, Rapid City and Sioux Falls.
Other meetings: Emil Michael, nominee for Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering; Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse, Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency; David McIntyre, President and CEO of TriWest; Bill Pulte, nominee to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency; King Abdullah II of Jordan; and Gary Cohn, Vice Chairman of IBM. As I mentioned, I attended the swearing-in ceremony for our new Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, whose nomination passed the Senate this week. I supported her through the process and look forward to working with her, particularly through my work on the Select Committee on Intelligence. I also attended our Senate Bible Study and our Senate Prayer Breakfast, where Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma was our speaker.
Hearings: I attended three hearings this week. One was a closed hearing in the Select Committee on Intelligence. One was a hearing in the Senate Armed Services Committee to hear from the leaders of United States Northern Command and United States Southern Command. I also attended a hearing in the Senate Banking Committee where we heard from Jay Powell, Chair of the Federal Reserve. You can watch my questions from that here.
Classified briefings: I attended one classified briefing on Central Command as part of my work on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Votes taken: 7 – we confirmed three additional cabinet nominees this past week: Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Secretary of Health and Human Services and Brooke Rollins for Secretary of Agriculture. We also took two procedural votes on the nominations of Howard Lutnick for Secretary of Commerce and Kelly Loeffler for Administrator of the Small Business Administration.
We’re working hard to get to the finish line on cabinet nominees. There are 24 positions within the executive branch that are considered “cabinet level.” Of these, two are not confirmed by the Senate: Vice President JD Vance, who was elected by the American people, and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, who was hand-selected by the President. This means we have just four nominees left before President Trump has his full cabinet in place, but rest assured we’re just getting started on the President’s plan to Make America Great Again.
Legislation introduced: I introduced two cybersecurity related bills this past week. The Cyber Conspiracy Modernization Act would strengthen penalties for cybercrimes. The Providing Individuals Various Opportunities for Technical Training to Build a Skills-Based Cyber Workforce Act of 2025 (Cyber PIVOTT Act) would provide scholarships to students and professionals training in cyber-related fields. You can read more about these bills here.
I also joined Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in reintroducing the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act to help put power back in the people’s hands instead of the administrative state. Under the REINS Act, once major rules from government agencies are drafted, they must then be affirmatively approved by both chambers of Congress and then signed by the President, satisfying the bicameral and presentment requirements of the Constitution. Currently, regulations ultimately take effect unless Congress specifically disapproves. Read more here.
My staff in South Dakota visited: Pierre and Tea.
Steps taken: 50,659 steps or 25.23 miles.
Video of the week: I joined Newsmax for an update on cabinet confirmations, as well as to discuss eliminating the federal Department of Education:
Are you familiar with Laura Loomer? I wasn’t either. From Wikipedia..
Loomer has worked as an activist for several organizations, including Project Veritas, the Geller Report, Rebel News, and InfoWars. She has described herself as being “pro-white nationalism” and a “proud Islamophobe”, repeatedly making anti-Muslim statements in public settings.
Loomer has gained notoriety as a result of being banned from numerous social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, payment processors, vehicles for hire, and food delivery mobile apps for various reasons, including violating policies on hate speech and posting misinformation. Loomer has also been banned and removed from events, and had press credentials revoked, for harassment and causing disturbances.
Donald Trump sought to hire Loomer to his presidential campaign in April 2023, but his senior campaign advisors successfully discouraged Trump from doing so.
This popped up on twitter a short time ago with a video clip, just as if this gal was there. Which is kind of weird if you’ve ever been to the Pierre Airport. But the silliness just starts with the clip that I would guess Toby had his PAC minion Brian Lewis film with his phone, so they could send it to her:
It gets even sillier with this scripted nonsense: “I have been told by my sources in South Dakota that many America First Leaders and activists have been pressuring Doeden to launch a run for Governor of South Dakota.”
Many America First Leaders? Well, that’s a fish story if I’d ever heard one. Who, exactly are these leaders and activists pressuring him? The person Toby sees in the mirror?
Or is the tweet referring to the people Toby has written a check to? Because there weren’t enough of them to stop the campaign finance fix for the loophole that allowed him to dump “loan” unlimited funds to his PAC, because there aren’t that many who were doing so otherwise.
And nevermind the fact that the script that Dumpster Doeden handed Loomer actually has the arrogance to refer to Dusty – someone who has been involved in the GOP over a lifetime – a “Republican in Name Only.” Ignoring the fact that Toby’s exposure to Republicans started what? A year ago? And he only voted in his first and only Republican primary in June of 2024?
I could go on, but I’ll just leave it at that. I have the sneaking suspicion that I will have ample opportunity to go on at length about Toby Doeden’s ridiculousness.
One of the goofier House Bills found itself on the House floor today losing. And it’s disappointing because it should have lost by a larger margin.
House Bill 1223, an act to provide for “I don’t feel like it” exemptions for vaccinations lost on a narrow vote of 36 to 34. It should have been a more significant margin, and I’m seeing some good Republicans who typically support businesses who seem to have lost their way.
I’m a bit shocked to see pro-business Republicans such as Reps Jamison, Fitzgerald, and Baumiller voting against business and basic science and instead siding with conspiracy goofiness on the Internet. C’mon guys…
Yes, Ezra Hays mailed out a several page saddle-stitched glossy booklet with misc information, including his life story, the platform, his proposed budget, etc., in his pursuit of the Republican Party chair election this weekend.
And it is this weekend when the pain is over, and a new adventure will begin with which I believe will give me many things to chronicle.
But as a quick summary, since it’s getting kind of hard to remember what all the candidates have been doing at this point, here’s what I can tell you from reports, personal observations, and a quick review of past posts:
I’m told Eschenbaum got a few Dems to swap parties to help organize an unorganized county to form a new GOP Committee, and he and Janet Jensen did a zoom call. Oh, and in a meeting, he called the people in the SDGOP “power hungry elitists.”
Hays did a website, text blasts, has been sending out postcards, and now this booklet. And to his credit, unlike the others, he did truck across the state to see people, including making it all the way over here to Brookings where he was at one of our last county GOP meetings.
Take it for what it’s worth, and how those activities matter to you in earning the vote of Central Committee members for the person who is going to be the next Republican Party Chairman. We’re almost at the finish line.
Yep. He’s downright fuming over the fact I’ve said that I absolutely believe that we should raise the age to marry to 18, as per Sydney Davis’ bill SB 156 that was heard yesterday.
So, straight from the former “Primary John Thune” facebook group, now known as the “the South Dakota Grassroot Conservative Republicans Facebook group,” Mike Zitterich’s rebuttal to my post unhappy about SB 156’s failure.
“By the time your children reach their teenage years, ages 13-19 becoming young adults, they begin to earn our respect, earning the the right to become employed (age 13), to drive on public roads (age 14), and beginning to form their own adult like relationships. Mind you, all by pertaining by the rules and guidelines as laid down by the rules of the home, their parents, so by age 16, they may get married to any adult older than 16”
—
“You see even Pat Powers falls victim to the b.s media clam that anyone having sex with a teenager is a pedo, when in fact, it simply violates the consent laws, where the parents must be involved in those types of relationships.”
This might be one of the most horrific and completely f’d up things I’ve ever read on facebook in a group that pretends to be a South Dakota “Republican” group. If a parent is involved in allowing a 13 year old to have a sexual relationship, most would consider that human trafficking, and they should be in jail for a very, very long time.
If you were against Senate Bill 156 to raise the age of marriage to 18, between these comments and California Carley’s equally messed up arguments – THAT’S why we need laws protecting 16 and 17 year old girls from someone marrying them away.
A South Dakota legislative committee advanced a bill Wednesday at the Capitol in Pierre that would subject schools, universities, museums, libraries and their employees to criminal prosecution and jail time for allowing children to view material defined in state law as obscene or harmful to minors.
