So this announcement came out yesterday in the afternoon:
An election for the Minnehaha County GOP already? What’s going on there? While the message is not specific, I would venture that it’s all related to the Minnehaha County GOP Tom Pischke censure fight.
That’s part 1. Part 2 of this post is even weirder. Recently, you might have caught the Minnehaha County GOP had announced a “Joint Legislative Wrap-Up” with the Lincoln County GOP, with the location as “The Alliance Center,” with the notation that “Map and details will be sent to those who register.”
The invite said that registrants get to hear from their legislators… with the list. Except it’s missing some people. Several in fact. In fact, the list of legislators seems to be almost exclusive to those who voted to lock-up librarians, and to vote similarly in lock-step on issues. So much so, that I reached out to one of the legislators who wasn’t on the list.
I asked if the event is a “come hear from the people they wanted to invite” type of event? I was told “they sent us an email asking us if dates would work for us. Then they never told us when the actual date would be.” Nice.
But then we got to the eve of the event, and my texts started blowing up.
I had a reader tell me that for this legislative forum, “They hid the address from people until they registered,” sending this sign up link:
So, the facebook link said it was being held at “the alliance.” This sign-up link said it was being held at the “South Dakota Military Alliance.” The problem? As my correspondent related to me:
The person I know registered but never got the address so she went to the Alliance building and the women there said, “you aren’t the first person coming here to find that meeting but we don’t know where it’s at but it might be at a place called the Triple A.” So basically, they announced and advertised it as being at the Alliance but actually had it at a different location.
What? So, they advertise it being held at one place… and it does not appear that happened, despite the fact they advertised it was being held at the Military Alliance?
The Lincoln County GOP did have a facebook post on it with some pictures.. and I don’t think that’s the SD Military Alliance, unless they were set up for a funeral or something:
Regardless, this is just kind of weird. You have the groups setting up a secret meeting with only some of the legislators, deceptively using an incorrect location, and seemingly trying to shut out some legislators even those Republicans who might only be more causally interested to attend. And coming at a time when the Minnehaha GOP leadership is busy trying to either kick people out, or are experiencing an exodus of leadership. All at the start of the 2026 election election cycle.
As I find myself saying all too often – I’m sure this will go well.
Is…is that a church? Are they holding their political meeting in a church? I’m coming to the conclusion that there is no hope for these people. Or for our state that seems fine electing them.
Are these the same legislators that did not show up to legislative forums during session where constituents showed up about these crazy bills to express concerns, opposition and ask questions? Legislators tied to these crazy bills were absent.
I notice Pischke wasn’t included on the list of speakers. I suspect Chair Korry Petterson is not interested in hearing anything Pischke has to say!
So big deal. The Republican party is now a true grassroot collection of real citizens now and not just a collection of super elitists of the state. Complain all you want, but you are seeing a party ran from the bottom up, and not the top down today, a true political movement. Gone is the infamous Chamber-Neocon Club, and in are just the normal, average joe and sally. I think what makes the former established actors so upset is they no longer can control the masses. It may have taken 20 years, but the real, true, everyday working people have finally taken control of the party. Now the real voice of S.D will be heard loudly. And the people have stated many times, it is not about the money, our voices are stronger together when we are all involved together.
The party is being ran from the bottom into the ground. The problem with “average Joe” is that he doesn’t understand anything. How to write a bill and get support. How to look for the unintended consequences of poorly written bills. The nuance of keeping the state out of unwinnable lawsuits just to push a bill through that’s not ready, or determinably unconstitutional. Average Joe just wants to yell about his “grass roots issue” and conflate national issues with state issues. In elected positions they do more harm than good because they lack experience and oftentimes intelligence. They can’t fundraise or support their party. You may think this is some win for the little guy, but these people are going to drive this bus off a cliff and we will all suffer.
On the contrary. A party ran by the average Joe and Sally is a win-win for the people. The S.D Republican party has 35% of S.D Citizens registered to it for a total of 321,000 members. The party operated from the bottom up, you are in fact getting a true voice of the people themselves. You mentioned that average Joe cannot write bill, or understand the process of drafting a bill. Fact is, he does not have to. It is about bringing forth concepts deriving from their district. There are 105 legislative members spread out across 35 districts. Or most importantly, that is 9,100 republican voters per each of the 35 districts. Our bills by rule, must only be 1 subject, must be written in simple logic so that someone with only a K-12 education can understand them. The human-element comes into play in everything we do in life. Because humans are far from perfect, God is the only perfect person I ever knew, that leaves us all prone to human-error. We live and die by our mistakes. We live, to learn from our mistakes, fixing such mistakes as we go about each passing day and year. As we have learned from this patriot movement over the past two decades, the people were not happy with the status quo, and fought for, and craved massive changes across the state, let alone country. Gone is the political correct mentality. Now it is, the people want the chance to make their voices heard. And this popularity movement gave us new people in our party. This is why we hold elections every two years. To cast out the old, with the new, and to maintain a ongoing change where changes need to be made. This is what some of you need to learn. Thank you for your input.