As Republicans battle for gubernatorial nod, Ahlers is SD’s best choice
Dusty Johnson, who has easily won four terms as our representative in Congress, had good reason to believe that he could glide into the Governor’s Residence, moving home to South Dakota to be with his family and out of the divisive partisanship in Washington. Of course, that was not to be.
It turns out that Dusty’s support was a mile wide and an inch deep. For the first time in South Dakota history, there will be a runoff election (on Tuesday, July 28, right before the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally) to determine the Republican nominee for governor, and Dusty Johnson will return to the private sector, having finished a humiliating third in his party's primary.
South Dakota is left with three possibilities for governor: Larry Rhoden, the rancher and welder from the remote community of Union Center; Toby Doeden, the extreme right-wing multi-millionaire from Aberdeen; and Dan Ahlers, the small town businessman from Dell Rapids who currently serves as the South Dakota Democratic Party’s executive director.
Doeden styles himself as a Donald Trump at the state level. Having never run for political office before, he is self-financing his campaign and plans to run state government like a business, shake things up and break things. He has made the implausible promise to eliminate property taxes, and perhaps he wants to eliminate public schools as well.
On the other hand, Ahlers and Rhoden both have served in the Legislature and have some experience with working across the aisle, compromising with people who do not totally agree with them, and achieving results. They are less likely to make extravagant or unrealistic promises.
In the Republican runoff, Doeden is likely to win the votes of the people who supported Jon Hansen, the speaker of the state House, who finished a strong fourth in the first round. Hansen fought hard against eminent domain for CO-2 pipelines, which was the decisive issue statewide just two years ago.
The new issue for property rights activists appears to be the threat of huge data centers, which have an insatiable demand for water and electricity. Doeden reportedly owns a data center, in addition to many car dealerships, which makes him an ironic spokesman for the property rights crowd.
If Doeden does get most of the Hansen vote, then Rhoden will need to win over Dusty Johnson’s supporters to stay competitive. After all, he is the incumbent governor, even if many South Dakotans still don’t know his name. In his time in office, Rhoden has moved away from some of Kristi Noem’s policies, working to re-establish communication with tribal leaders and making reasonable judicial appointments without regard to political affiliation.
Even though he hails from rural West River, Rhoden could have some appeal for the state’s political establishment.
The right-wing rebels who ousted multiple incumbent legislators in the 2024 Republican primaries, largely on the CO-2 pipeline issue, suffered some reversals in this month's legislative primaries, especially in the state Senate. There was an unusual infusion of big corporate money (from ethanol giant POET and from Meta, among others) in local legislative primary races. We should wonder what these corporations will want in return; huge tax breaks and a total lack of regulation of data centers is one likely answer.
If we truly want to “SAVE SD” — which is one of Doeden’s slogans — and restore some semblance of balance to our state government, our best option is clearly Dan Ahlers. He would be our first Democratic governor in 48 years, and he could veto the most irresponsible legislation.
On the other hand, Ahlers has served in the Legislature in the past, and has a lifetime of experience running a small business and leading the Dell Rapids Chamber of Commerce. He can’t be credibly tagged as a radical, and he knows South Dakota from the ground up.
After the open racism and blatant corruption of the Kristi Noem years, Ahlers offers our state the chance to begin healing and restoring some civility to our state politics.
Jay Davis of Rapid City is a retired lawyer and regular contributor to The South Dakota Standard.
Photo: From Dan Ahlers Facebook page
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