Beaudion’s exit from senate race gets nasty, pressures Bengs
As if Brian Bengs’ independent candidacy for the U.S. Senate didn’t have enough political challenges, Julian Beaudion’s recent withdrawal as the Democratic candidate for that seat took an ugly and accusatory tone over the weekend. Bengs is on the receiving end of Beaudion’s comments, along with other entities, both inside and outside the Democratic Party.
Read the link to a substack post attributed to Beaudion and you’ll be as surprised as I am by his detailed timeline of events and groups that put the pressure on him to withdraw from the race.
Beaudion’s specific claims as to what happened to him during the prelude to his withdrawal puts not only Bengs, but Beaudion’s own Democratic Party, into a bad light.
He names two groups, “East River White Men” and “American Muckrakers,” as organizations that worked to remove him from the ballot. I couldn’t find anything about the former group, but did find a site for American Muckrakers, who claim to “have been holding terrible politicians and people accountable since 2021.”
As to the first group, the “East River White Men,” Beudion (who is black) says they or an intermediary approached him and “I was told explicitly that my race was central to the effort” to get him off the ballot.
Of American Muckrakers, Beudion writes, “American Mutckrakers had contacted the South Dakota Democratic Party regarding financial information about me. According to what was relayed to me, the message was essentially this: pressure Julian to leave the race or damaging information would be released.”
Later in the piece, Beaudion writes that “an influential Democrat in the state … told me that I was the most toxic thing ever to happen to the South Dakota Democratic Party. He told me that if I remained in the race, donors would leave the party and that he intended to contact people about it.”
Beaudion also relates a direct conversation with independent candidate Brian Bengs, in which Bengs says, “if you stay in the race, things will get worse for you.”
True or not, this is interesting and powerful stuff. Very interesting and very powerful, actually.
If the story moves from the blogosphere to the mainstream media I think it will hurt Bengs’ inherently fragile candidacy. Bengs certainly doesn’t need a distraction like this to take time and attention away from his message and his image to voters.
I noted here earlier that a coalition of Democrats and independents has a mathematical chance against Republican incumbent Mike Rounds. That coalition needs to be solidified, not fragmented by Beaudion’s refusal to go down quietly.
Bengs has to step out forcefully and put these statements to rest or accept the fact that, left unanswered, any chances he has of winning the general are a goner.
Photo: from Brian Bengs Facebook page
John Tsitrian is a businessman and writer from the Black Hills. He was a weekly columnist for the Rapid City Journal for 20 years. His articles and commentary have also appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The Denver Post and The Omaha World-Herald. Tsitrian served in the Marines for three years (1966-69), including a 13-month tour of duty as a radioman in Vietnam. Republish with permission.
Photo: from Brian Bengs Facebook page
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