From my mailbox, Bonnie Omdahl asked to submit this Guest Column in support of John Fitzgerald for Attorney General:
In the current political milieu many people seem to lose sight of the fact that our elected officials are our employees. When you hire an employee, the main goal should be to select the person whose skills and qualifications most closely match the duties and requirements of the job. I want to urge the SD GOP precinct committee women and men to carefully and logically consider which of the Republican candidates for Attorney General possess the necessary skills and experience. The Attorney General is South Dakota’s Chief Prosecutor. When a county prosecutor needs help with a murder case you want the Attorney General to have the knowledge to know how to help and who to send. If South Dakota needs someone to argue before the Supreme Court, you want someone with years of experience in appellate courts. When the State of SD needs legal advice on civil matters you want someone who has handled similar questions for his county.
John Fitzgerald has the extensive prosecutorial experience needed. During his years as a State’s Attorney, he has personally prosecuted hundreds of cases. His experience with drug cases is particularly important given the opioid and methamphetamine crises. John Fitzgerald continues to serve Lawrence County as a full time States Attorney with a heavy case load. He is currently managing that busy office and staff while maintaining his campaign. He has proven he can do the work.
Equally important, John Fitgerald is running because he genuinely wants the job of Attorney General; he wants to serve the state he loves. It is not a stepping stone to the next political office. We are blessed to have other candidates who have served South Dakota in honorable ways. I appreciate their service, but when we vote we need to consider more than who is our friend and who has best played the political game. We need to ensure our candidate is not only someone who is principled and who shares our political views but someone who will be the best possible person for the job. South Dakota deserves an Attorney General who has proven his priority is his dedication to the job he has been elected to do.
Bonnie Omdahl
Sioux Falls
the efforts to continue to resurrect a dead campaign continues
Is this a slam on Marty Jackley?
Thank you Pat for letting me speak. I must say I was stunned that anyone would take my comments as an attack on Marty. Though we have two amazing candidates for Governor, Marty has my support in that race. We are very lucky to have such a choice in that race. I hope that the primary races remain positive. I know the choices this year were hard for many. It is a sign of the strength of our party that we have that much depth. When people go so negative in the primary it is a disappointment to me. It weakens good candidates. We should be a party of ideas not personal attacks. With few exceptions I will wholeheartedly support whoever wins the primary in all the races.
As to SB 70, I was glad to hear all the candidates for Attorney General say it had serious problems and they hoped to see those addressed in the next legislature.
Perhaps I don’t understand the system but it troubles me to see so many anonymous comments. Seems like yellow bellied cowardice to refuse to acknowledge your own viewpoints.
I took it as an attack on Marty also….WTF
So Marty is AG and running for Governor and should not be?
Isn’t this the wife of Dave Omhdal
https://www.argusleader.com/story/blogs/danaferguson/2016/02/06/lawmaker-trans-community-sorry-youre-so-twisted/79933180/
Who is she and why should her opinion matter to me?
Bonnie is both a Medical Doctor and a Lawyer having both MD & JD degrees.
Her support is a serious blow to Ravnsborg and Russell. Bonnie is well liked and respected among conservatives. They also work to garner votes for their candidate in the biggest county in the state.
At least he finally got a Republican to support him…instead of just Democrat Aaron McGowan telling is who we should pick.
“we need to consider more than who is our friend”
Fair advice. Let’s ignore the ties of friendship and trust the folks most knowledgeable & passionate about locking up bad guys: cops.
S.D. Sheriffs & law enforcement want serious / violent / dangerous felons convicted. Policemen get very frustrated when prosecutors fail. Hence, I’ll support whichever candidate the most cops endorse. Do you believe our sheriffs & officers would back an AG candidate whom they find unprepared to convict rapists and killers? Really? Why? Do cops want more acquittals? Or perhaps you think mere Policemen aren’t qualified to judge prosecutorial ability. I demur. If the majority of active law enforcement supports one candidate, I’ll follow that considered judgment, not superimpose my own “higher” wisdom.
Maybe law enforcement is frustrated as all get out with these wonderful career prosecutors who know everything and caved like a hat on sb70 and sb73 and got is in this mess. We put their lives on the line each day so the defendants can beat us out the door.
No way am I ever supporting Fitzgerald. He has no connections to any legislators to make that happen…no ideas…and everyone in law enforcement I have talked to has said he is not their choice.
Very well said a friend of education.
It feels like Fitzgerald and Russell are upset Ravnsborg has such a high support from all these individuals and are trying their best with lies to discredit him.
Jason got the sheriffs to endorse him in 2015 and 2016 when no on else had announced and when no one else was running. Make no mistake that was a smart move on his part but, it does not mean he is qualified to be the attorney general. Has he has never prosecuted a criminal case? Has he ever defended a felony case at trial? What is his record? Has he ever argued before the supreme court aside from when that estate case he handled was dismissed for failure to prosecute and cost were taxed against him for $2,700?
Litz, We all can see your in the bag for Fitzgerald or one of his family members…when you acknowledged his dad worked for the mafia you had too many details that were not reported publicly.
I look at all your posts through that slanted lens.
No one should knock ravnsborg for getting sheriff endorsements. Those are really good gets also. He sat down and convinced them he was the man for the job. Maybe no one else met with them.
I still prefer the other two but JR should get his due for his efforts.
Ravnsborg’s core support is his minnehaha base. This is an erosion and quite a surprising one from long time delegates. This is a big get.
Fitzgerald got a nice foothold here. I strongly prefer Fitzgerald and Russell for the top spot.
Republicans should wake up! Jason Ravensborg ran a state wide campaign for a full year and got less than 3% of the vote. LESS THAN 3%.
Qualifications aside, Jason is not a good candidate for the General and we could very easily lose the AG position to a liberal Democrat.
Republicans should wake up! Jason Ravensborg ran a state wide campaign for a full year and got less than 3% of the vote. LESS THAN 3%.
Qualifications aside, Jason is not a good candidate for the General and we could very easily lose the AG position to a liberal Democrat.
yeah (completely different race running against an ex-governor with $1 million dollars) its much better to pick 2 guys with ethical problems who could not even carry their home counties when they ran for circuit court judge or one who only got around 10% of the vote in running for Attorney General before….vs the guy who has law enforcement already behind him and the only thing against him are the lies his opponents keep making up….hmmm yeah tough choice…said no one ever
GO JASON!
Repeat, LESS THAN 3%. Bosworth got almost twice as many votes as Jason.
Ok, point taken, but he took that loss with far more class and grace than the supporters of Fitzgerald and Russel seem to be able to show in regards to Jason’s candidacy.