Today is the deadline for Democratic and Republican candidates to submit their nominating petitions to run for Legislature and other offices. With seven hours to go until the 5 p.m. CDT deadline to hand petitions to Secretary of State Jason Gant, here's the scorecard for the parties on filling Legislative slots, boiled down from the official SOS candidates list:
| Senate | House | |
| Dem candidates | 13 | 29 |
| Dem primaries | 0 | 2 |
| Dem empty slots | 22 | 43 |
| GOP candidates | 32 | 61 |
| GOP primaries | 4 | 6 |
| GOP empty slots | 8 | 19 |
So far Republicans have fielded 2.2 times as many candidates as Democrats. They also so far have 5 times more fun—i.e., primaries—than we Dems. Only two races have more Dems than seats:
- House District 1, with newcomers Dustina Gill and Steven McCleery challenging incumbent Dennis Feickert;
- House District 26A, one of our two single-seaters, with Joshua Wilson and Shawn Bordeaux, both of Mission, on the ballot.
Democrats have 62% of Legislative slots to fill; Republicans just 26%. Let's see more petitions!
And remember, even if you can't deliver those petitions to Secretary Gant in person today, you can mail them, but they have to be sent registered mail by 5 p.m. today!
Watch Secretary Gant's Twitter feed for down-to-the-wire updates today, as well as the official candidates list, which Sec. Gant updates daily and which should be finalized, barring challenges by the end of the week.
Update 11:47 CDT: Holy balls of liberalism! In the last half hour, Secretary Gant has tweeted the certification of petitions for eight Democratic candidates for Legislature and two Republicans. The Dems include Augustana economics professor Reynold Nesiba for District 13 Senate and Rochelle Hagel, sister of District 9 Rep. Paula Hawks, for District 33 House.
Update 21:40 CDT: Here's the above chart updated with Secretary Gant's approved candidate list as of end of business today:
| Senate | House | Total | |
| D-cand | 22 | 43 | 65 |
| D-primary | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| D-empty | 14 | 29 | 51 |
| R-cand | 35 | 72 | 107 |
| R-primary | 4 | 8 | 12 |
| R-empty | 5 | 9 | 14 |
The Dems recruitment is terrible, but the GOP recruitment so far hasn't been great either. I know there are some that wait until 5pm and get registered mail, but its still not great, compared to other years.
Interesting, Joe! I don't have Monday numbers handy for past years, but come the end of this week, we can compare full primary slates to see if recruitment has dropped for both sides. Could there be some general deflation of enthusiasm on both sides? Should we expect candidate enthusiasm to be higher in a non-presidential year in South Dakota, which coincides with all of our statewide races?
What is the South Dakota Democratic Party doing? Shouldn't they have a very active role in this process?
I heard that District 6 will someone in all the slot entered.
I was asked to run in District 19 and I would have loved to but I'm graduating from Mitchell Tech in May and I have to find a job above all else.
If I walked into a job interview and said I was running for state office and I'd be gone for 3 months I don't think I'd get the job.
But I was flattered that they called me and maybe in the near future I'll do it.
Reynold Nesiba for District 13 Senate............wow a Dem!
Students love him! Funny and intelligent.
Now let's see what he has to say or if just a soft Dem.
From what I read, no Annette Bosworth. I'll bet all the multi-colored pens and the three people using them were working overtime today to get petitions filled out and in the mail by 5 p.m.
Too early to set the race match ups. It will be a couple of days before all candidates are known. The Gant office is very slow in releasing names.
Nesiba? Soft? Go check out the tough economics posts on his Facebook page, if you can. He could be South Dakota's Robert Reich. He also has some macho snow boots. :-)