Back in late October, early November, we started drafting our legislative wish list. It was a long one. Residency, voter rolls, machines, vote centers, absentee ballots, and transparency were at the top of the list.
Monday, March 10 was the big day three of our key election bills passed the Senate floor, and are now waiting for the Governor’s signature!!
Having experienced the games played in Pierre for the past three years, we were a lot more savvy this time around. The Lord blessed us with several new legislators that were not afraid to champion election bills, despite the warnings from more experienced legislators. The theme was “well, you are brave.” Interesting mindset isn’t it? You have to be really brave (or naive) to sponsor bold election reform bills. Just our kind of hero.
HB1066 – An Act to revise residency requirements for the purposes of voter registration.
We effectively killed the bill before it was even heard in committee, thanks to the immediate answer to the call to action from all of you!
Help Protect SD Residency – support HB1066 – email now!
HB1066 started out as a three page bill, addressing residency and voter challenges, along with acceptable documents for proving residency. The bill narrowly passed House State Affairs 7-6. After that, Rep. Tony Kayser took the feedback, went back and amended the bill into a very simplified version, addressing only residency as defined in SDCL 12-1-4.
After a lot of interference from lobbyists, two weeks of non-stop work, multiple meetings with Deputy SOS Tom Deadrick, and back and forth with House Leadership, Rep. Kayser stuck to his guns with his simplified version of the bill, which only sought to define residency requirements for voting. Senator John Carley did a lot of heavy lifting in this time period as well.
Who knew adding the words “usually lives and sleeps” and “30 continuous days” could be so contentious!?
House Leadership made it known that the residency issue needed to be addressed and fixed this year. So, HB1066 was referred back to House State Affairs after the amendments were worked out, and it passed 8-2.
Rep. Kayser gave a momentous performance on the floor of the House and the bill passed 47-22. You can listen HERE. This is when we realized we had a real shot at getting it across the finish line!
After that, HB1066 passed Senate State Affairs 8-1, and passed the Senate 23-11. You can listen to that floor debate HERE. Because a couple of words were amended in Senate State Affairs, HB1066 was sent back over to the House for concurrence and that passed 51-18!
HB1066 was delivered to the Governor for his signature on March 13, 2025!!
HB1208 – An Act to designate an individual using the address of a mail forwarding service or post office box when applying to register as a voter or vote by absentee ballot as a federal voter.
Joni Tschetter was ROBBED
Before session began, we knew legislators were trying to figure out how to close the loophole the state had allowed to become a pathway to fraud. The outcome of Joni Tschetter’s D15 race, and the evidence gathered in the recount got a lot of attention. Several times in discussions, the topic of a federal only ballot had come up.
After HB1066 had been presented, and in the midst of negotiations with the lobbyists and Secretary of State’s office, HB1208 was dropped by Rep. Kayser as a sister bill to HB1066.
HB1208 passed House State Affairs 8-2. You can listen to the testimony HERE. It then went to the House Floor and passed 46-22. Rep. Kayser again did an outstanding job of explaining the intended effect of the bill, which was defending the bona fide residents of the State of South Dakota from outside influence in our elections. You can listen HERE.
HB1208 was heard in Senate State Affairs on March 6th. Only 10 minutes of proponent time was allowed, and Rep. Kayser used most of it as he passionately presented his bill. Chair Mehlhaff allowed other in the room testimony, and ironically, lobbyist Justin Smith had to come as a begrudging proponent. Smith’s testimony was more of an opponent testimony, but stated his clientele were willing to compromise and that the Senate had to pass this bill to accompany HB1066. (Smith represents the commercial mail receiving agencies or what we call PMB’s)
Why were they willing to compromise you might ask? Since HB1066 had already passed, and defines residence as “usually lives and sleeps” with “30-continous days”, all the PMB voters would not be qualified electors according to statute.
We have already proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that 99% of these voters never did meet the requirements of the state to vote, perjured themselves, and were illegally registered and voting in our state, but the changes in this bill are the final nail in the coffin.
Also, Sen. Amber Hulse’s SB185 had already passed both chambers, which allows the residents of the state to challenge voters based on RESIDENCY. Which means, a voter who does not live where he says he does, can be challenged and potentially removed from the rolls. PMB lobbyist Justin Smith knew this, and realized his clientele could potentially not be voting at all in South Dakota soon.
Sen. Pischke stepped out of Senate State Affairs during the midst of the hearing to go to another committee, while Sen. Deibert made a motion to send HB1208 to the 41st day (to kill it), seconded by Mehlhaff, which failed.
Sen. Jensen then made the DO PASS motion, which risked failing with Sen. Pischke not in the room.
By the hand of God, Justin Smith of all people, retrieved Sen. Pischke from the other committee, who made it back with about 2 seconds to spare to vote YES for HB1208. It passed committee 5-3 with Sen. Sue Peterson excused for an illness, a true miracle. The Senate then voted in favor 25-9, and the House concurred with the amendment 56-13.
HB1208 was delivered to the Governor for his signature on March 13!
This means local elections in Districts 15 and 35, Minnehaha, Pennington, Lawrence, Hanson, and Lincoln Counties might look a lot different in years to come.
Most importantly, only South Dakotan’s will determine the outcome of South Dakota elections!
HB1062 – An Act to amend provisions pertaining to the maintenance and publication of the statewide voter registration file.
- Keep a historical archive of data sets available to the public on the website.
- Require the county auditors to capture an election day voter list and to preserve and maintain that record for 22 months.
- Merge the absentee data with the voter file.
- Make all publicly available voter data free of charge.
- Remove rule making authority from the Board of Elections, and assign to the Bureau of Information and Telecommunications. (BIT)
- Add year of birth to the list of publicly available information.
Currently, a statewide voter file costs $2,500 and the absentee file is $3,000. Three additional copies of the statewide file are available for an extra $250, so purchasing all the data for one election year ends up costing $9,250.00. Despite Rachel Soulek testifying that our rates are lower than surrounding states, South Dakota is actually in the top ten most expensive states in the country to purchase public information.
HB1062A passed House State Affairs 9-3, and the House Floor 37-31.
Senate State Affairs heard HB1062 on March 3rd, which ended up being a very long day as committee didn’t start until 3:00 PM. The Capitol was full of patriots that day, as many property rights advocates were there donning yellow shirts in support of HB1052. Many stayed way longer than they had planned to speak in support of HB1062.
Despite proponent testimony from several GOP precinct committee members, county and state executive board members, and citizens from all areas of the state, Sen. Deibert made a motion to send to the 41st day (to kill the bill), seconded by Sen. Larson. HB1062 died with Beal, Deibert, Karr, Larson, and Mehlhaff, voting YES and Jensen (Kevin), Peterson (Sue), Pischke, and Perry voting NO.
On March 6th, Senator Sue Peterson successfully smoked out HB1062 on the Senate Floor and it was calendared with a 20-14 vote.
The main opposition to the bill was designating rule making authority to BIT. BIT said that cybersecurity changes by the minute, so any rules made would be obsolete. All rule making authority was then removed from the bill. You can listen to the testimony HERE.
On the morning of March 10th, SOS Election Director Rachel Soulek sent out an email to the entire Senate claiming HB1062 put their office in significant financial and security risk, that fees were consistent with surrounding states, and that the verbiage in the bill using “master registration file” would expose personally indentifiable information (PII) and would require heavy redaction by auditors. However, the term “master registration file” is already in statute, and all PII is already redacted each time a voter file is requested.
Soulek claimed other neighboring states charge much more for voter data, including Nebraska: $500, Montana: $5,000, Iowa: $1,500, and North Dakota: $2,120. Remember, a years worth of data in SD is $9,250.
That morning, an amendment was drafted and published by Sen. Peterson allowing increased fees for paper copies and a $225 fee for an electronic statewide voter file. (We are not sure who ever requests a paper copy of a voter roll)
Immediately before floor session, the SOS office removed their opposition to the bill, which left the senate no reason to oppose. Even as amended, the secretary of state will be required to capture a voter roll snapshot, merged with the absentee data, and post it to their website weekly, available for free download to the public.
HB1062 passed the Senate in a 20-12 vote! We were told it’s rare for a bill to be smoked out and make it across the finish line. It’s passage was a real miracle! A HUGE win in transparency for the People.
HB1062 was delivered to the Governor for his signature on March 13!
None of this would have been possible without your engagement on our calls to action. We heard many times throughout the session that legislators had noticed and commented on how many emails they received on various bills, particularly HB1066 and HB1208.
YOU MADE A HUGE DIFFERENCE
Thank you for reading and supporting this Substack, for sharing, praying, showing up in person, testifying, writing, calling, texting, county commission public comments, voter challenges, and all the likes and shares on social media.
We won the narrative,
All Glory Be to God!! We witnessed and felt so many God moments that only He could have worked out throughout all of this. Our prayers were answered.
“The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.” – Exodus 14:14 NIV
“Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” – Deut 31:6
“Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” – Mark 11:24
We will share in the near future several other election bills that passed that you may not be aware of.
