Larry Rhoden spent his first eight months as governor steering South Dakota onto the high ground of civil discourse, only to follow Kristi Noem back into the gutter last week.
Noem, the head of the federal Department of Homeland Security, was in Broadview, Illinois. Protesters have been amassing for weeks at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility there to express disapproval with the Trump administration, resulting in clashes with authorities.
Following her usual impulse to provoke rather than problem-solve, Noem inserted herself into the tense situation with YouTuber and podcaster Benny Johnson in tow, filming her every confrontational move. That included a stroll up to the door of the Village of Broadview Municipal Building with her entourage to ask if she could use the restroom.
Somebody standing on the inside of the door kept it shut and said “no you cannot.”
Noem swiveled and stormed off.
“That’s what Governor Pritzker says is cooperation and keeping people safe,” she blurted on her way past Johnson as he filmed the encounter.
Indeed, how could JB Pritzker, the Democratic governor of Illinois, forget his solemn oath to support the constitution, faithfully discharge his duties, and facilitate bathroom breaks for presidential Cabinet secretaries?
Rhoden, a Republican who succeeded Noem as South Dakota’s governor in January, was similarly offended. He shared the footage of Noem’s bathroom brouhaha on X (formerly Twitter) and added his own written comments.
“Kristi is the toughest woman I know,” Rhoden said. “If Pritzker thinks a locked door will stop her from enforcing the LAW, then he is severely underestimating my friend.”
But Rhoden wasn’t finished. He followed Noem onto the low road and went even lower in his attack on Pritzker.
“Maybe he should clean up Chicago,” Rhoden said. “Or at least eat a salad.”
That’s apparently supposed to be a joke about Pritzker’s well-chronicled efforts to lose weight.
Not laughing? Neither am I.
It’s disappointing that Rhoden would write those words or allow them to be written on his behalf. It’s also hypocritical coming from a hat-wearing cowboy who’s been on a high horse lecturing South Dakotans about civility ever since he pledged, upon becoming governor, that it would be “one of the pillars of my administration.”
As recently as Sept. 12, Rhoden philosophized about the importance of “civil discourse” in the weekly column he distributes to the media. He said civility is the best way to honor Charlie Kirk, the conservative activist and commentator who was fatally shot a couple of days earlier in Utah.
On the same day he released that column, Rhoden used his official Facebook account to advocate — unsuccessfully, as it turned out — for the firing of a University of South Dakota professor who posted insensitive comments about Kirk in the hours after the shooting.
“We must not send the message to our kids that this is acceptable public discourse,” Rhoden said.
That effort to tear down a USD professor’s career for ill-advised but constitutionally protected free speech stands in contrast to Pritzker’s past efforts to build up the same university. In 2007, Pritzker’s family foundation donated $5 million to help build the Theodore R. and Karen K. Muenster University Center, named in honor of the parents of Pritzker’s wife, Mary Kathryn “MK” Pritzker, who was raised in South Dakota.
Rhoden, meanwhile, is fixated on more recent contributions totaling $790,000 from Pritzker’s issue-based nonprofit, Think Big America, to support a ballot question last fall that would have added abortion rights to the South Dakota constitution. Voters rejected the measure, as Rhoden noted in his X post about Noem’s bathroom video.
“The last time JB Pritzker picked a fight” with Noem and South Dakota, Rhoden said, “it didn’t go well for him.”
Perhaps Rhoden needs a reminder that contributing to a ballot question committee does not equate to picking a fight, and a disagreement over immigration policy does not justify a demeaning comment about a fellow governor.
If he doesn’t know that, he should spend more time reflecting on his own words from last month, when he admonished everyone to honor Charlie Kirk’s legacy by “continuing to talk to each other and focusing on reason and principle, rather than personal attacks.”
- Seth Tupper is editor-in-chief of South Dakota Searchlight. He was previously a supervising senior producer for South Dakota Public Broadcasting and a newspaper journalist in Rapid City and Mitchell. South Dakota Searchlight is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
