Political Smokeout

Daugaard cancels special legislative session

The special legislative session intended for next weekend has been cancelled.

Gov. Dennis Daugaard had called the Legislature back to Pierre for a one-day meeting to appropriate more money for the replacement veterans home in Hot Springs. That long-gestating project hit a recent cost overrun of around $10 million.

Originally, Daugaard’s staff believed a delay on that project would cost the state its grant from the federal Veterans Administration. So he called the special session to appropriate more money so the over-cost project could proceed without delay.

But now the VA has granted South Dakota an extension on its grant.

“This additional time will allow us to revisit the current plans, seek a scaled-back redesign, and rebid the entire project,” Daugaard said in a news release.

Daugaard said he’s ordering “the entire project be reevaluated, redesigned, and rebid” and now believes the state can achieve considerable cost savings.

Though the state accepted a bid from the contractor Scull Construction, Daugaard said the company has agreed to “set aside our contingent acceptance of the bid.”

A new plan will be presented to the Legislature next January at its regular session.

Breaking: Rep. Kristi Noem won’t run for Senate, will run for reelection

One of the biggest names in South Dakota Republican politics has decided not to run for U.S. Senate, heading off what could have been a fierce intra-party battle.

After months of consideration, Rep. Kristi Noem announced Tuesday that she won’t run for Senate against former Gov. Mike Rounds. Instead, she’ll seek a third term in the House of Representatives.

The U.S. Senate race is a rare open seat, created by the retirement of Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson. With control of the Senate in the balance, South Dakota voters could help shape the country’s political direction for years to come.

Noem’s decision is good news for Rounds and GOP officials hopeful to avoid a civil war.

“I would have encouraged Kristi to exercise her rights to run for whatever she wants, but frankly, as a party chairman, this is good news,” said Craig Lawrence, the chairman of the South Dakota Republican Party. “I don’t want our two titans to shoot each other.”

Experts said Noem’s news is a blow to Democratic hopes that Republicans would damage each other in a contentious primary. While Rounds is still likely to face one or more challengers, none of them have Noem’s name recognition.

Noem, 41, seriously considered running for Senate, including talking with Sen. John Thune and some outside groups about the prospect.

But she ultimately chose to avoid a primary battle against Rounds, a two-term former governor who left office with high approval ratings.

“After spending the weekend discussing our future with Bryon and our children, we decided that right now we are in the best position to serve South Dakota as a member of the U.S. House,” Noem said in a statement.

In her statement, Noem thanked “everyone who has encouraged me and pledged support for a potential campaign for the U.S. Senate.”

Running against Rounds might have just been too risky for Noem’s career, even against the prize of possibly winning a U.S. Senate seat.

“She would losing an almost-sure-thing House seat to take an enormous risk, and one that might end up burning a lot of bridges with the state party,” said Jon Schaff, a political science professor at Northern State University. “She’s still pretty early in her career…  This is probably not her best chance of success. I would bet she’s anticipating that chance will come in the future.”

Rounds declared his candidacy late last year, an early start Schaff said may have deterred Noem from taking the plunge. 

After Noem’s announcement, Rounds’ campaign manager released a statement thanking Noem and endorsing her House reelection bid.

“He respects her decision and we’ve pledged to do everything in our power to assist in her re-election to the U.S. House of Representatives,” said Rob Skjonsberg, Rounds’ campaign manager, in the statement. “It’s time to come together and support a united team for South Dakota.”

The two spoke Tuesday morning about Noem’s decision.

Though Rounds endorsed Noem, the congresswoman didn’t say she’s supporting Rounds for Senate. In her statement, she said she would “work hard to help elect a South Dakota Republican to the U.S. Senate next year” but didn’t mention Rounds.

Rick Weiland, a former aide to Sen. Tom Daschle and two-time congressional candidate, is the only announced Democratic candidate. In a statement, Weiland said Noem’s decision doesn’t change the race.

“The question before her decision and after it remains the same,” he said. “Are we going to keep letting big money run the show in Washington, or are we going to take back our country and put it to work for everyday South Dakotans instead of billionaires and big corporations?”

Ex-Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, a Democrat who lost to Noem in 2010, also publicly considered running for Senate only to decide against it. U.S. Attorney Brendan Johnson, the son of retiring Sen. Tim Johnson, also pondered a Senate run but decided to stay out.

Noem’s decision doesn’t clear the field for Rounds, so far the only announced Republican candidate. Some conservative activists have called for a “conservative alternative” to Rounds, saying he’s not far enough to the right.

A number of current and former state lawmakers have said they’re thinking about running against Rounds in the GOP primary. Dr. Annette Bosworth, a Sioux Falls physician, announced Monday she is exploring a Senate run as a Republican.

None of them could match Noem’s profile. A two-time statewide victor, including in a hotly contested 2010 race, Noem is widely known, a tenacious campaigner and a strong fundraiser.

Despite these credentials as a candidate, some of Rounds’ fiercest opponents on the right said Noem wasn’t the conservative alternative they were looking for. National groups like the Club For Growth and Senate Conservatives Fund said she doesn’t meet their standards of fiscal conservatism, though Noem dismissed the criticism.

With Noem definitively out of the Senate race, observers expect other contenders to make their moves soon.

“Now that she’s announced for the House, there are going to be people that are going to step up,” said Bill Napoli, a former state lawmaker from Rapid City who has considered running for Senate himself. “I think you’re going to see things start happening very quickly now.”

Lawrence said the party will remain impartial and welcome any extra candidates. But he sees Rounds as a strong candidate.

“If anyone wants to run against Mike, that’s their right and they can have at it,” Lawrence said. “The party will remain impartial. But we are happy when there isn’t a primary and you have a strong candidate.”

Senate Conservatives Fund rejects Noem as ‘conservative alternative’

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how some national groups seeking a “conservative alternative” to Mike Rounds in South Dakota weren’t very big on his highest-profile potential opponent, Rep. Kristi Noem.

The Club For Growth explicitly rejected Noem as insufficiently conservative. The Senate Conservatives Fund at the time held their fire, saying they were still evaluating the congresswoman.

Now Nathan Gonzales writes in Roll Call that the SCF has passed judgment on Noem, and they’re not fans:

“We’ve looked at Kristi Noem’s record but, unfortunately, we won’t be able to support her if she decides to run. Her votes to raise the debt limit and to increase taxes as part of the fiscal cliff deal make it all but impossible for our members to back her campaign,” added (Senate Conservatives Fund leader Matt) Hoskins, who said Noem’s vote for the farm bill was the final straw.

Now, these two groups aren’t the only fish in the sea. If Noem runs she’ll probably get plenty of support. But at least at this point it doesn’t look like she’d be able to unite all the anti-Rounds forces in the GOP.

Bosworth’s big names

Sioux Falls physician and potential U.S. Senate candidate Annette Bosworth has never run for political office, but yesterday she told the press some political heavy-hitters have encouraged her to run.

To KELO, Bosworth said U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn — himself a medical doctor who made the leap to politics — is “one of her mentors in considering a run.”

Bosworth didn’t mention Coburn to me in my interview, but she did talk about another person she said encouraged her to enter politics: former Gov. Bill Janklow.

“The idea actually was first introduced to me over three years ago by Bill Janklow,” Bosworth said. “He was my good friend and many times said, you’ve got a lot of great ideas for how health care and our community could be served better. He was the first person to plant the idea.”

At the time, Bosworth said she demurred. “I said no, Bill. You did politics. I’m meant to be a doctor.”

Janklow died in January 2012. By the time U.S. Sen. Tim Johnson announced his retirement this March, Bosworth said she had come most of the way around to running.

Bosworth says she represents new generation for Senate

A Sioux Falls physician is exploring a run for the U.S. Senate.

Dr. Annette Bosworth, 41, said she wants to talk to more South Dakota voters before deciding for sure whether to seek the Republican nomination. But she’s already visited Washington, D.C., to meet with potential supporters and has come up with a few campaign pledges, including a promise to term limit herself if elected.

“I feel very confident I have a voice that matches South Dakota, but not confident enough I won’t listen and sit still with South Dakotans, and really, truly understand if this is something they want,” Bosworth said Monday.

Bosworth said she’ll decide whether to run in the next month.

In an interview with the Argus Leader, Bosworth cast herself as a “change agent” who represented a “new generation” of Republican leadership, and said she’s running against “career politicians.”

If Bosworth does run, it would be her first bid for elected office, but not her first time in the spotlight. She previously made the news for a long-running battle with the South Dakota Board of Medical and Osteopathic Examiners, which involved accusations from both sides and ended in a settlement.

She says standing up to the board’s charges — which at one time threatened her medical license — demonstrated fortitude and character she says will serve her well in Congress.

“Your approach to how to be a change agent is about a strong character, someone who can stand still in the midst of adversity and in challenges,” Bosworth said. “Those types of character developments will lead to a better politician.”

Bosworth cast herself as an innovator trying to bring change, both in her medical practice and in politics. She cast her dispute with the medical board as an example of big government trying to quash innovation. 

Among other things, the board had accused Bosworth of improperly employing an unlicensed physician’s assistant. She agreed to repay some Medicaid reimbursements but didn’t admit wrongdoing. 

If Bosworth were to win, she would be the first U.S. Senator from South Dakota without political experience since Chan Gurney was elected in 1938. But she disparaged the importance of experience in government, calling it an outmoded idea.

“There is a different philosophy for Gen X-ers that says, take the experiences you have in life and apply them to the job you’re going to do,” Bosworth said. “Use the morals and the skills you’ve honed in the industry you’ve been using and apply those.”

One Republican has already entered the South Dakota Senate race, former Gov. Mike Rounds. Bosworth said his experience as governor weren’t good preparation for the U.S. Senate.

“Does South Dakota want a career politician?” Bosworth said when asked why she’d run against Rounds in the Republican primary. “(Or) does South Dakota want a different choice? That’s the conversation I hope to have over the next month.”

Rounds released a statement very similar to his campaign’s responses to previous potential candidates.

“We are focused on building a strong, statewide organization,” Rounds’ aide Rob Skjonsberg said in the statement. “We’ve said from the beginning that we’ll be prepared to take on all comers.”

Relatively unknown candidates occasionally beat popular politicians like Rounds, but usually don’t, said Ken Blanchard, a political science professor at Northern State University in Aberdeen.

“Rounds is seasoned, he’s well-liked, he’s won twice statewide. Those are things that make a candidate pretty strong for the Senate,” Blanchard said. “You would think, given his strong position going out the starting gate, that he would be hard for a relatively unknown candidate — or even a better-known candidate — to challenge.”

But Blanchard said that sometimes voters just opt for a fresh face. That, or mistakes by Rounds’ campaign, or a bitter battle against another high profile challenger like Rep. Kristi Noem, could all open the door to a dark horse like Bosworth, he said.

Bosworth said health care is her principal policy focus. She said she’s a fierce opponent of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

“I think South Dakotans need a strong voice to come up with an innovative way to not have big government running medicine,” Bosworth said. 

She also said her faith is leading her toward the race.

“The trials of the last three years, I’ve really felt that God has been preparing me for something that I couldn’t see,” she said. “I still don’t have the vision of God, but I would like to have a conversation with South Dakota to see if they’re interested in a new generation of politicians in the Republican Party to lead South Dakota for the next six years.”

Alice Kundert died this morning

According to multiple reports, Alice Kundert died this morning at the age of 92.

Kundert was a prominent figure in South Dakota politics for more than 20 years, serving as state auditor from 1969 through 1979 (winning election even during the height of Democratic strength in the state’s history), secretary of state from 1979 to 1987, and capping it off with two terms in the state House from 1991 to 1994.

A Mound City resident, Kundert was also active in the South Dakota Teenage Republicans.

Purity vs. pragmatism on Obamacare

My story in this morning’s paper took a look at an interesting question about governing styles: is it right for a lawmaker to try to get money for their state from a program they oppose?

South Dakota’s two Republican members of Congress, Sen. John Thune and Rep. Kristi Noem, say yes. They’re both highly critical of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and have voted against it and to repeal it on numerous occasions.

Both of them wrote letters supporting a Rapid City nonprofit’s application for a grant under the Affordable Care Act, and both said there was nothing wrong or contradictory about that.

“I see no conflict whatsoever in seeking fair treatment for South Dakotans under existing law, and still being opposed to the law and seeking to overturn it,” Noem said.

It didn’t make it into the article, but I asked Noem about a debate in the House lately, when top GOP leadership proposed repealing part of the health care law. Some conservative lawmakers revolted, saying that bill would work against the cause of repealing the entire law by making it slightly less onerous — and that voting to repeal only part of it could be seen as tacitly endorsing the rest.

Noem said she doesn’t agree with that approach.

“My job right now is damage control on that bill,” she said. “My preference obviously is to repeal it. (But) I have voted for bills before that have removed damaging portions of it.”

Not everyone agrees. A curious alliance of conservative activists and Democrats said Thune and Noem were being contradictory or hypocritical by seeking money for their state under the law they opposed.

“I guess (they are) trying to have it both ways,” (South Dakota Democratic Party chairman Ben) Nesselhuf said. “This is further evidence that Republican opposition to the Affordable Care Act is largely a political ploy.”

It’s a demonstration of one of the biggest cross-sectional divides in politics, between purity and pragmatism. You see this on the GOP side with the activists who are upset at Mike Rounds, an avowedly pragmatic Republican. (I’ve even started seeing some conservatives use “pragmatic” as a pejorative.) You saw it on the Democratic side with the liberal activists upset at Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, whose defenders also praised her pragmatism.

While there’s some correlation between the pragmatism-purity axis and the moderate-radical axis, they’re not identical.

If you’re pragmatic, you’re more willing to make compromises on what you believe (whether those beliefs are liberal, conservative or moderate) in order to get things done. A pragmatic believes making those compromises lets them accomplish their goals step-by-step, and makes success more likely than an all-or-nothing approach.

A purist sees compromising your beliefs to get things done as the worst thing you can do, as betraying those beliefs. They believe that if they stay true to their ideals, they’ll ultimately win out and succeed, while compromises to get a little bit of what you want usually end up backfiring and hurting your cause.

What do you think? Did Thune and Noem do the right thing by being pragmatic about the Affordable Care Act and helping their constituents with it, or should they have been pure and rejected money for their state because they opposed the bill?

Matt McGovern moving to D.C.

Matt McGovern, the unsuccessful 2012 Democratic Public Utilities Commission candidate and grandson of George McGovern, is moving to Washington, D.C.

McGovern, 41, said he’s heading to the nation’s capital for better career opportunities.

“I figure I’ll find something better if I’m out there,” he said. “It’s easier if you’re there already.”

Among his job prospects are doing legal work, or working for the government or a nonprofit. He’s not yet a member of the Washington, D.C. bar, but said he hopes to rectify that soon.

He grew up in Wisconsin, and moved to South Dakota nine years ago for what he originally thought would be a short-term gig as a law clerk in Rapid City. Instead he ended up living in the state for almost a decade, doing several different jobs in law and politics before running for office last year.

McGovern is the second 2012 Democratic candidate to leave the state. U.S. House candidate Matt Varilek recently accepted a job as the regional director for the federal Small Business Administration and will be moving to Colorado for the job. (The third Democratic statewide candidate last year, PUC nominee Nick Nemec, will presumably be staying on his Holabird farm.)

Some of McGovern’s friends and supporters encouraged him to run for office again next year, when Democrats will have to field candidates for governor, U.S. House and a host of constitutional offices.

He said he enjoyed being a candidate and would like to run for office in the future, but “pretty early decided I wouldn’t be running for office in 2014.”

“It wouldn’t be the right time for me to do it again so soon after the last one,” McGovern said.

The taxation of hunting grounds

One of the more interesting side notes in yesterday’s news about Gov. Dennis Daugaard permitting land purchases by the department of Game, Fish & Parks is the reminder that the state pays property taxes to local governments on the lands GF&P buys for conservation or hunting purposes.

Generally speaking, that’s highly unusual.

In a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case early in the 19th Century, McCulloch v. Maryland, Chief Justice John Marshall looked at the constitutionality of a Maryland law taxing out-of-state bank notes — designed to target the federal Bank of the United States.

Overturning the Maryland law, Marshall famously wrote:

That the power to tax involves the power to destroy; that the power to destroy may defeat and render useless the power to create; that there is a plain repugnance in conferring on one Government a power to control the constitutional measures of another, which other, with respect to those very measures, is declared to be supreme over that which exerts the control, are propositions not to be denied.

The ruling established the principle that lower levels of governments couldn’t directly tax higher levels of government. (Some indirect taxation applies — for example, South Dakota gets a lot of revenue from its contractors excise tax from road contractors working on federal highway projects.)

So Hughes County in Pierre, home to tons of government property, doesn’t get tax revenue from it. School districts with lots of federal land rely on the federal impact aid program, which provides compensation to local governments for the untaxed government land.

Why, then, is the state of South Dakota paying property taxes to counties for GF&P land?

The answer is, the state voluntarily chooses to. It enshrined that in the state constitution, as an exception to the general rule that state property is exempt from taxation:

The property of the United States and of the state, county and municipal corporations, both real and personal, shall be exempt from taxation, provided, however, that all state owned lands acquired under the provisions of the rural credit act may be taxed by the local taxing districts for county, township and school purposes, and all state owned lands, known as public shooting areas, acquired under the provisions of § 25.0106 SDC 1939 and acts amendatory thereto, may be taxed by the local taxing districts for county, township and school purposes in such manner as the Legislature may provide. (Emphasis added)

This exception is an olive branch to local governments, so that the state buying conservation or hunting land doesn’t hurt their revenues by removing that land from the tax rolls.

And how much does this olive branch cost the state of South Dakota? Last year, Game Fish & Parks paid just over $1.2 million in taxes on its land, according to department secretary Jeff Vonk.

Daugaard to allow GF&P land purchases again

After taking office in January 2011, Gov. Dennis Daugaard fulfilled a campaign promise by imposing a moratorium on new net land purchases by the Department of Game, Fish & Parks.

Now, more than two years later, that moratorium is over. Daugaard will allow the state to resume “prudent” land purchases, with new requirements for taking input from local government and the public.

The department primarily buys land to preserve wildlife habitat or open up hunting. But the practice had opponents, especially with the South Dakota Stockgrowers and other West River groups. So the governor promised to look at the process, and put a temporary halt to the land purchases after taking office.

The new policy allows land purchases, but requires county commissions to get advance notice of any purchases over 80 acres, and gives the public an extra 30 days for public comment.

According to the release, Game, Fish & Parks buys land only from willing providers (no eminent domain to get conservation land), and voluntarily pays property taxes to local governments even though the state doesn’t have to UPDATE: The South Dakota Constitution actually provides for the payment of property taxes by the state on “public shooting areas.” Almost all other state property is exempt from taxation.

Tony Venhuizen, Daugaard’s senior adviser, said the governor seriously considered extending the moratorium further, but ultimately decided against it.

“He decided we were at the point where we could go back to considering this on a case-by-case basis,” Venhuizen said. “The sense that he has is that what’s really important in these acquisitions is to be cognizant of local interests.”

The moratorium didn’t ban all GF&P purchases. It was still allowed to buy land to form the state park at Blood Run, for example. And it could still make conservation land purchases — as long as it sold an acre for every acre it bought.

Is this a good move by Daugaard?