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Small businesses are the heart of our communities, providing employment and driving innovation at the national, state, and local levels. In South Dakota, 88,000 small businesses make up 99% of businesses in the state, employing nearly 210,000 people, more than 58% of our workforce. These businesses make large and small impacts in our communities and beyond.

Running a small business certainly comes with challenges. Many business owners are facing regulatory burdens, unfilled job openings, inflation, and limited access to capital. Because of their investment and impact on our communities, we look for opportunities to support small businesses—not just for their benefit, but for the benefit of our friends and family who work there.

As Chairman of the Republican Main Street Caucus, I lead a group of 70 conservatives in Congress that are committed to implementing pro-growth policies for small businesses and fostering economic and individual prosperity. We strive to preserve main streets across America. Inflation and unfilled job openings continue to pressure small businesses, so it’s important to support these businesses however we can. Some ways we can do that are shopping local, eating at a local restaurant, passing policies to support main street, stopping unnecessary federal spending, and reducing overly burdensome regulations.

This Small Business Week, I got to stop by several community favorites in Mitchell like Bonnie’s deKor, Craig Ryans, Einstein’s Vintage Clothing, and some of my favorite restaurants. It’s the people who work at these small businesses that make them so special. Whether it’s your favorite local coffee shop, hardware store, auto repair shop, restaurant, or clothing store, the owners likely know you by name and have built a relationship with you. Supporting small businesses keeps our communities thriving and unique. I’m grateful for the ways South Dakota’s small businesses support our needs. Our local communities would be vastly different without them.

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 “Everyone must visit beautiful South Dakota. Pack your bags and rush to the car and start driving. With so many fun and exciting things to see and do, what will you do first?” Those are the words of an elementary school student who visited the Black Hills with his family last summer. He wrote a school report on his trip called “The Best Place to Visit.”

Stories like this are why we’re celebrating National Travel and Tourism Week. From May 7-13, we will appreciate and honor everything that the travel & tourism industry does for South Dakota.

Tourism is one of South Dakota’s largest industries. Visitors spent a record-breaking $4.7 billion in 2022, generating 11% of total state sales tax collections. And the money that tourism brings in every year eases every South Dakota household’s tax burden by $1,011.

We are so fortunate to welcome people from across the nation and around the world to our “Great Faces, Great Places.” Here in South Dakota, visitors get to create lifelong memories, and every one of our citizens benefits from that.

We broke records last year, but 2023 is looking even better for the travel industry. 84% of Americans have a tentative trip planned for the next 12 months, with the majority planning to travel in June and July. Excitement for leisure travel is at a record high level – and domestic leisure is travelers’ top discretionary spending priority. While many are concerned about the national economic climate, 53% of consumers are prioritizing travel in 2023, and 93% have travel plans in the next 6 months.

This all fits perfectly with the theme of National Travel and Tourism week: Travel Forward. We as South Dakotans know that attitude well. No matter what we face, our state’s residents know how to buckle down and keep moving forward. We also know how to celebrate – so let’s do it. Let’s come together and use this week as a time to celebrate South Dakota’s thriving travel industry.

We can do this in a lot of different ways. Share your favorite South Dakota stories, destinations, and pictures on social media with #HifromSD, #NTTW23, and #TravelForward to show your appreciation for our hard-working tourism folks during National Travel and Tourism Week from May 7-13.

Most importantly, don’t forget to enjoy this amazing state yourself. Head out in a direction you’ve never been to see what you can find. Discovery is everywhere in this state. Take some time to explore. Even as a lifelong South Dakotan, I am always surprised with the sights and delights I continue to find across our great state. Whether it’s a fresh donut from a small-town bakery, or crossing Spearfish Canyon off your bucket list, see what you can discover. I promise you’ll be surprised with how much is out there.

National Travel and Tourism Week is an important celebration of one of South Dakota’s strongest and most beautiful industries. Let’s rejoice. Let’s explore. Let’s “Travel Forward” into what’s sure to be one of the state’s best tourism years ever.

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Shane Penfield Named Prosecutor of the Year

PIERRE, S.D.  – The South Dakota State’s Attorneys Association has named Shane Penfield as the Prosecutor of the Year.

Penfield is the State’s Attorney for Corson, Dewey, Perkins, and Ziebach Counties. He received the award Thursday during the association’s annual meeting in Deadwood.

“Shane has been a dedicated public servant who is a strong voice for victims of crime,” said South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley.

The Prosecutor of the Year award, established in 2002, is given annually to an outstanding South Dakota prosecutor.

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From Dakota News Now, the station for political reporter Austin Goss, who was arrested for a prank call impersonating Governor Kristi Noem, is announcing his termination from employment:

“We learned of the incident involving Austin Goss late last night. Once we gathered the facts, we decided to terminate his employment with our stations. Dakota News Now and KOTA Territory were unaware of Mr. Goss’ activities and deeply regret the lack of judgment he showed, which violated our policies and is contrary to our commitment to the highest standards of journalistic integrity.”

Read the entire story here.

That’s too bad, as everyone makes mistakes.

But, when you’re a political reporter and choose to impersonate one of the people you’re covering, that’s kind of a tough one for an employer to get past.

According to UJS records, Goss is scheduled to make his initial appearance in court in Stanley County on May 23rd.

Gov. Noem Signs Executive Order Banning Tencent

PIERRE, S.D. – Today, Governor Noem signed Executive Order 2023-06 banning Tencent Holding, Ltd. (“Tencent”) for state government agencies, employees, and contractors using state devices. Tencent is a China-based technology and media conglomerate, is one of the world’s largest companies, and poses similar cybersecurity risks to South Dakota as ByteDance and TikTok. Photos of Governor Noem signing the Executive Order can be found here.

“My number one responsibility as Governor is to keep the people of South Dakota safe. South Dakota started the movement that has swept the country to ban TikTok on government devices,” said Governor Noem. “Now, I am extending that ban to Tencent and other Chinese companies that are threats to our security.”

This Executive Order bans the downloading or use of any application or visiting of any website owned or controlled by Tencent Holdings, Ltd. on state devices, networks, etc. by:

• Employees of the State of South Dakota;
• Agencies of the State of South Dakota; and,
• People or entities who contract with the State of South Dakota, including any state agency, commission, or authority agents thereof.

This Executive Order also gives the Commissioner of the Bureau of Information and Telecommunications the power to ban any other application, website, platform, service, or product whose use or access would be detrimental to state security in the same way as Tencent and Bytedance. The Commissioner will keep a publicly accessible list of entities banned under this Executive Order and Executive Order 2022-10.

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In continuing developments in the Dakota News Now/Austin Goss arrest story, an on-line profile for Goss which was available earlier today at https://www.dakotanewsnow.com/authors/austin-goss-1/…

…is no longer available, and is leading the user to the following 404/Page Not Found website error…

 

Goss’ information has also been removed from Dakota News Now’s “Meet the team” page.

Dakota News Now has not released any information in the matter aside from the story on their website, as well as on their sister station’s website.

KELOland has a fancy infographic with dramatic music on the Austin Goss arrest story that they’re running on their website. Given that Dakota News Now are their big competitors for the televised media space..

You can view it at keloland.com.

Dakota News Now has posted their story on their reporter Austin Goss being arrested.. and they seem to be mincing few words on how they are portraying it:

Political reporter arrested for impersonating Noem

Political reporter Austin Goss of Dakota News Now was arrested for making a prank phone call while impersonating Governor Kristi Noem.

Read it all here.

They’re pretty abrupt about the matter, and it seems like they’ve ripped the bandaid off. We’ll see how this story continues to develop.

In other court news.. besides a convicted felon/track coach/Regents employee allegedly slapping a student, and the arrest of one of South Dakota’s political reporters, former Republican State Senate candidate Joel Koskan is now part of South Dakota’s sex offender registry, with the central clearinghouse for state sex offender information noting his mugshot, crime, and present place of residence at the South Dakota State Penitentiary.

You can look up sex offender information at the state’s Sex Offender Registry website here.

From the Argus Leader comes additional reporting on the story we broke earlier today:

A Dakota News Now reporter has been arrested on charges alleging he made a prank phone call to the former chair of the South Dakota Republican Party using Gov. Kristi Noem’s personal cell phone number, according to court documents.

The Stanley County Sheriff’s Department confirmed that Austin Goss, the capitol bureau reporter for Dakota News Now, had been arrested Thursday morning and released on a personal recognizance bond.

and..

Investigators said given that Goss likely had both Noem’s and Lederman’s cell phone numbers, and that his internet connection was password protected, probable cause existed that he made the call.

Read the entire story here.

I did reach out to former SDGOP Chair Dan Lederman for comment, and he noted that he “wasn’t going to comment on an ongoing criminal investigation.”