If you recall the e-mail blast sent out by Democrats that I posted this AM, they made a rather boastful claim about how they were doing with their legislative recruitment:

As you’ll note, they even went the extra mile to bring attention to it – not only did they use BOLD TYPE, but they went the extra mile to also HIGHLIGHT IT IN YELLOW to bring everyone’s attention to it. (#Winning!)  “For the first time IN DECADES we have potential candidates in EVERY legislative district.”

Now, here’s where it gets funny.

KELO AM thought there might be a story of a political party comeback. So they asked the SDDP about it

The South Dakota Democratic Party says today in an email that for the first time in decades, they have potential candidates in every legislative district in South Dakota.

However, the state party is not willing to release a list of committed candidates.

“To be clear, it is still early, and many of the candidates are still potential and not confirmed at this point,” said Aaron Matson, SDDP communications director. “We’re not releasing numbers at this point, but due to the grassroots energy and interest in running we’re seeing all over the state, we feel much better about filling all 105 slots than we did at this point in 2015. That’s not a guarantee, but we are feeling cautiously optimistic.”

Read that here.

Wait, what? They have them…. but they won’t release a list?

Seeing this boastful claim from a political party that’s had problems producing candidates, such as in 2016… and 2014… and 2012, where they actually raided a nursing home for a 92 year old candidate…  you kind of have to take their claims with a grain of salt.  A big – huge – 12 ton grain of salt. 

When Democrats’ Communications Director Aaron Matson claims “they have potential candidates in every legislative district in South Dakota,”  it’s like he’s been taking propaganda lessons from North Korea. I’m surprised we haven’t seen something on Twitter like this:

Dems – you all just keep on claiming you’ve got candidates in every district… just like North Korea claims it has discovered unicorn lairs.

There might be someone out there who believes you.

Noem: Black Hills to Benefit from New House-Passed Forestry Provisions

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Kristi Noem today joined the House in passing H.R.2936, the Resilient Federal Forests Act, which pairs a responsible budget fix with targeted forest management reforms to dramatically improve the health and resiliency of the nation’s forests.

“The years-long pine beetle epidemic has turned much of the Black Hills into a tinder box,” said Noem. “We are fortunate to have so many dedicated foresters working in this area, and I’m proud to have scored some critical victories in support of their efforts over the years. The Resilient Federal Forests Act would put additional tools at their disposal. With the House’s stamp of approval, I strongly urge the Senate to take the legislation up quickly and allow these critical resources to be deployed.”

“Hill City School District is extremely grateful to see an extension of Secure Rural Schools through passage of theResilient Federal Forests Act of 2017,” said Mike Hanson, Hill City Superintendent. “Our school district receives no state aid and is heavily impacted through federally owned acres. The loss of Secure Rural School dollars requires the district to increase the use of reserve funds in our operational budget as well as look at cost reductions that may have a negative impact on student learning. This extension of Secure Rural Schools allows our district to continue providing the best educational opportunities for our federally connected students! We wish to thank all members of the House who voted for this Act and especially South Dakota Representative Kristi Noem! Your leadership and dedication makes a powerful impact on our nation’s public schools!”

“This is a great news for many schools in the Black Hills,” said Mark Naugle, Custer Superintendent. “This legislation will help to make up for the decrease in revenue from local timber harvesting.  It will also help to offset the impact of Federal ownership of property in local school districts.  Custer School District would like to thank Representative Noem, and Senators Thune and Rounds, for supporting provisions which help our school districts.”

The bipartisan Resilient Federal Forests Act would, among other things:

• Permanently solve the wildfire “borrowing problem. Without authorizing new spending, the bill provides a fiscally responsible solution to end fire “borrowing” (the practice of transferring funds from forest management to firefighting, which increases the risk of wildfires). It does so by allowing FEMA to transfer funds to the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management.
• Eliminate paperwork. The legislation would reduce duplicative paperwork for forest management projects by allowing National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) exclusions, as long as the project is consistent with existing forest plans.
• Address obstructionist litigation. To promote the quick resolution of litigation against forest management projects, the bill would create a new arbitration pilot program that would require litigants opposing a forest management activity to come to the table with an alternative proposal rather than just saying “no.”
• Bolster tribal participation in forest health projects. Under the bill, we would expand authorities for tribes to manage adjacent national forests to reduce the risk of wildfire, insects and disease.
• Support local governments and modernize the Secure Rural Schools & Community Self-Determination Act. With an updated Secure Rural Schools provision, schools in counties like Custer, Fall River, Lawrence, Meade and Pennington would have greater flexibility in how they choose to use these critical funds.

With passage in the House, the legislation will next be debated in the U.S. Senate.

Noem has long been an advocate for provisions to increase the health of South Dakota’s forests as well as a champion of modernizing the Secure Rural Schools provisions. In November 2013, Noem brought U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell to view the pine beetle epidemic’s damage first hand. Months later, policies Noem helped write were included in the Farm Bill and became law. This included provisions to cut through environmental red tape, get boots on the ground faster, and allow the Forest Service to work on the scale this epidemic required. Around 1 million acres of the Black Hills National Forest benefited from the reforms. In May 2017, Noem welcomed U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue to the state as well to visit the Black Hills National Forest, among other locations, and discuss outstanding needs.

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Rounds Urges UN Ambassador to Address North Korea Cyberattacks

WASHINGTON – U.S. Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, today joined his colleagues in sending a letter to U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (UN) Nikki Haley, urging her to work with members of the UN Security Council to pass a resolution to more aggressively deter and punish North Korea’s cyberattacks. While the UN has repeatedly condemned North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, the country’s regime continues to reap substantial revenue from cyberattacks around the world. This letter comes ahead of President Trump’s visit to Asia later this week.

“Recent estimates indicate that North Korea’s cyberattacks provide the North Korean government with as much as $1 billion per year – a staggering figure equivalent to one-third of the country’s exports,” wrote the Senators. “North Korea’s ransomware attacks and cyber-attacks on banks around the world are producing funding streams that we must cut off immediately. Tough rhetoric must be backed up by practical measures that make it clear to North Korea that their behavior cannot continue…we must do more to confront those countries who enable North Korea and incentivize them to crack down on North Korean hackers and prevent access to their networks.”

In addition to Rounds, the letter was signed by Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Al Franken (D-Minn.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), David Perdue (R-Ga.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).

Full text of the letter:

Dear Ambassador Haley:

We write to urge you to continue expanding efforts to hold North Korea accountable with the international community through the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). As a permanent member of the UNSC, the United States plays a leading role in developing and passing increasingly stronger resolutions to restrict North Korea’s exports in an effort to exact international economic pressure on this rogue regime for its nuclear ambitions. While these resolutions continue to make it more difficult for North Korea to fund its nuclear program, we must also consider lucrative funding streams beyond its exports, including revenue it reaps from cyberattacks. Of the eight UNSC resolutions related to North Korea passed since 2006, none have specifically addressed its use of cyberattacks that wreak international havoc. As such, we urge you to work with members of the UNSC to pass a resolution to more aggressively deter and punish North Korea’s cyberattacks in order to cut off this illicit funding stream.

Recent estimates indicate that North Korea’s cyberattacks provide the North Korean government with as much as $1 billion per year – a staggering figure equivalent to one-third of the country’s exports. North Korea’s ransomware attacks and cyberattacks on banks around the world are producing funding streams that we must cut off immediately. Tough rhetoric must be backed up by practical measures that make it clear to North Korea that their behavior cannot continue. North Korean hackers often operate from abroad, notably in China as they rely on its internet structure. As such, we must do more to confront those countries who enable North Korea and incentivize them to crack down on North Korean hackers and prevent access to their networks.

As the targets of these attacks and the impacts of these heists reverberate around the world, the international community must work together to combat them. For instance, last year the Lazarus Group, a North Korean-linked cybercrime ring, stole $81 million from a Bangladesh Central Bank account at the New York Federal Reserve, which would have been $1 billion except for a spelling error. They have been tied to the WannaCry attack earlier this year that impacted over 200,000 victims in 150 countries, as well as the Sony attack in 2014. Last month they were also linked to a $60 million theft from a Taiwanese bank. Without stronger condemnation and efforts to limit North Korea’s cyber abilities, these attacks will continue unabated.

As a world leader, the United States must do everything in its power to choke off any flow of funding to North Korea to prevent it from advancing its nuclear weapons program. As the international community has begun to unite its position on this issue, we urge you to use this opportunity to identify and address cyber concerns in an effort to more aggressively pursue North Korea’s finances. We look forward to working with you on this important national security issue.

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The South Dakota Republican Party has an e-mail blast of it’s own this morning, warning members of the pitfalls of signing the ballot measure petitions being circulated out there at the last minute, and to join the party’s planned efforts to fight some of the ballot measures that could appear in 2018:

Nothing leaves you scratching your head in the morning like a SDDP e-mail begging for money:

So, let me get this straight… the bad news is that the GOP is somehow “scared” that Democrats could have “the momentum to win next year.” That’s why the GOP “added South Dakota to the Young Guns program.” And the alleged good news for dems is that they claim to “have potential candidates in EVERY legislative district.”

They’re leaving out the part where the worse news for them is that apparently they have no idea what they’re talking about, as the Republican National Congressional Campaign Committee’s Young Guns program has utterly nothing to do with how many Democrats they claim they’re trying to talk into running for legislative seats.

And you should notice they couch it in terms of “potential candidates in EVERY legislative district.”

That could be true. But it’s as equally as plausible to state that I could potentially be a millionaire if every man, woman and child gave me $10. The potential is there. It could happen.

And after over a decade of Democrats letting their party decay and wither, it might just be more likely.

The remaining ballot measures that are out there circulating are bringing their efforts to a close, and according to the Associated Press, the most lethal one thinks that if they collect enough signatures, it will be “by the skin of their teeth:”

Mentele, who estimated backers had about 15,000 signatures in hand for the medical marijuana proposal, said the group would also send out circulators to people who are housebound.

“Death with Dignity” measure sponsor Angela Albonico said she plans to collect signatures on the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Indian reservations this week as volunteers contact people who have expressed interest in signing on. She said if supporters “do make the ballot, it’ll be by the skin of our teeth.”

House Speaker Mark Mickelson, who is pursuing the ballot question campaign finance measure and a proposal to raise tobacco taxes to improve tech school affordability, said he’s exceeded 15,000 signatures for both proposals, totals that he anticipated would continue to climb.

Read it here.  (Update – new link, the previous one trimmed the article)

The Secretary of State website notes in cases of initiated measures, “the petition must have signatures of registered voters equal to five percent (13,871) of the total vote for governor in the last gubernatorial election.”

And some of these measures are claiming they’re within only a thousand or so of these numbers?  I’d be getting nervous at this point.  Signature collection is difficult, and if they’re only sitting with 14 or 15 thousand signatures in hand, I would not be confident of success.

Whether they’ll pass the Secretary of State’s signature review depends on the petition signature collection accuracy rate, which at least one campaign has noted had suffered a setback as they discovered at least some signature forgeries, which may have set them back, or at least given their opponents something to consider in evaluating if it is worth their while to take a run at the petitions in a court of law.

Stay tuned.