Posted on 03/28/2024 9:14:03 AM PDT by Signalman
Former President Donald Trump said he is considering South Dakota Republican Gov. Kristi Noem as his vice presidential nominee for 2024.
“Kristi Noem has been incredible fighting for me,” Trump said on Fox News last month. “She said, ‘I’d never run against him because I can’t beat him.’ That was a very nice thing to say.”
Noem’s track record as governor, however, showcases a state executive more eager to capitulate to corporate constituents at the Chamber of Commerce and capitalize on the glamour of political stardom than governing on behalf of Republican voters.
Three years ago, Noem shot down a transgender sports ban that would have barred males from competing in women’s sports. She ultimately signed a similar bill a year later as she faced re-election in the deep red state, after spending the 11 months prior aggressively sabotaging the effort to please corporate interests. That sabotage included funding primaries against members of her own party who acted on their knowledge that men and women are different.
Noem initially rejected the legislation in response to a lobbying campaign from the South Dakota Chamber of Commerce. It formed a coalition to block the bill, alleging fear of reprisal from the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Noem’s chief of staff at the time of her 2021 veto was Tony Venhuizen, a board member of the Sioux Falls Chamber of Commerce. The business group listed the ban on male athletes dominating female leagues as a “tier 1” priority “of the highest importance” to oppose.
Another top advisor to the South Dakota governor included Matt McCaulley, a lawyer and lobbyist whose clients The Federalist reported include Sanford Health. Sanford is a rural health conglomerate that owns Sanford Sports Complex in Sioux Falls, which hosts major NCAA events.
Sanford Health has also committed transgender medical interventions on minors, according to 2020 testimony before the South Dakota legislature. It used its substantial weight in the state to oppose the invasive procedures that the state legislature finally managed to ban in 2023 after Noem received pressure from voters and conservative media.
Noem’s corporate-friendly governance extended to standing idly by as South Dakota landowners face eminent domain lawsuits to seize their lands for a carbon capture pipeline. Corporate interests behind the project include Noem’s son-in-law, who lobbied lawmakers last year around the same time the legislature denied protections for residents opposed to the pipeline on their land.
The two-term governor built a national reputation on resisting the coronavirus lockdowns. Noem was the only state executive who never ordered businesses to close, a fact that her team touted to Republican voters as she flirted with a presidential campaign in 2021.
“For those of you who don’t know, South Dakota is the only state in America that never ordered a single business or church to close,” Noem said that year at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), one of the nation’s largest annual gatherings of grassroots conservatives. “We never instituted a shelter-in-place order. We never mandated that people wear masks. We never even defined what an essential business is because I don’t believe governors have the authority to tell you your business isn’t essential.”
Except early in the coronavirus panic, Noem had asked the legislature for exactly the powers she claimed she had rejected: authority to determine which businesses are “essential.” Jon Schweppe, policy director for American Principles Project (APP), outlined in a Substack post how Noem’s alleged refusal to shut down South Dakota was actually a decision the state legislature made for her.
On March 30, 2020, at the request of Gov. Noem, South Dakota Rep. Lee Qualm introduced House Bill 1297, a bill that would declare a state of emergency in South Dakota and give the Secretary of Health unprecedented powers to impose mandates and lockdowns, allowing for the placement of ‘reasonable restrictions’ on any public or private location, including a ‘business, park, school, or other location that promotes public gathering.’
“Unwilling to grant the executive branch that level of unchecked power,” Schweppe added, “the South Dakota House of Representatives emphatically rejected Gov. Noem’s bill.”
Noem then harnessed the political capital of lockdown resistance the legislature had earned, through credibility with Republican voters leftist media gave her through their vicious attacks. Rolling Stone Magazine named Noem the “COVID Queen of South Dakota.”
Other outlets also pinned any rise in the state’s coronavirus cases on the governor. “South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem says lockdowns are ‘useless’ as state’s COVID-19 cases soar,” ran a headline from ABC.
South Dakota ultimately did no worse in terms of excess all-cause mortality than surrounding states in the first year of the pandemic. The Washington Post, however, made sure to give Noem the “Crazy Eyes” treatment. The paper pinned the outbreak on the governor and featured the image below with the headline: “South Dakota’s governor resisted ordering people to stay home. Now it has one of the nation’s largest coronavirus hot spots.”
This is how media treat every significant Republican woman. Noem’s treatment recalls that of former Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann. See, for example, this Newsweek cover.
Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin received similar media treatment when she was tapped in 2008 to run for vice president. Noem can expect no less this fall if she gets the Trump pick. But hate from the media doesn’t mean Noem is a great pick.
Whether she ultimately runs for vice president or not, Noem has already skipped to cashing in on her minor celebrity status with influencer-style promotional videos. Trump, the RNC, and Republican voters eager to reclaim the White House don’t need this distraction on the ticket.
Byron would need to move out of Florida to make that work. Stefanik is NY right? I don’t think that would help. Trump won’t win NY. I think he needs to win WI, MI or PA. If he loses all those states then Biden would be reelected. Nominating Tim Scott would increase his chances in those states I think. He needs to peel off some black voters in Philadelphia, Detroit and Milwaukee.
JD Vance would probably be the best VP pick.
HE WOULD BE PERFECT,BUT CAN’t HAVE TWO WHITE MALES ON THE TICKET!
I don’t see how JD Vance attracts a single vote to the Trump ticket that Trump doesn’t already have locked up.
Trump’s Secret Weapon: The Genius of Choosing Senator JD Vance as VP
“I personally think the southern border crisis is a historic catastrophe, so I’d focus my efforts there. And there is a jarring contrast between that crisis and the one in Ukraine: for four years, Congressional Democrats (and Republicans) refused to give Donald Trump $4bn for a border wall; they gave Joe Biden $14bn for aide to Ukraine in a week.”
Trump is only one very busy man and will need enforcers in his administration to ensure MAGA is carried out. From 2017 through 2020, Mike Pence didn’t provide that. Vance can, and that’s a recipe for a vastly more effective Trump White House.
By picking Vance—by picking the second-youngest senator, a brilliant man who understands the MAGA impulse at its core and has a full career to bring it to fruition—Donald Trump doesn’t just have to make a play for a second term. He makes a play for immortality. As the 4th century was the Age of Constantine or the 9th was the Age of Charlemagne, Trump can make the 21st into the Age of the Donald.
https://revolver.news/2024/03/trumps-secret-weapon-senator-jd-vance-vp/
If that is true, then Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
Of course North Dakota is a sure Republican state. Youngkin might be able to pull Virginia into Trump's column. But the criterion should be who would make the best President if something happened to Trump. Don't repeat the mistake the Republicans made in 1864. Second most important criterion would be someone that would deter the Democrats from trying to get rid of Trump.
Trump should pick the best person, not someone who checks a certain diversity box.
Donald Trump Jr. is not a natural born Citizen. His mother wasn’t a U.S. Citizen when he was born.
She’s not Constitutionally eligible.
That may have been what the founders envisioned, but in the modern age the most important criterion for a VP candidate is helping the President get elected.
She might be but I’d like to play with her for a weekend just to see what happens.
Opps, you're right!
the criterion should be who would make the best President if something happened to Trump
That's a good point.
Sarah Huckabee.
“I’m like the other poster that said I’m voting for Trump no matter who his VP pick is (well, you know what I mean)...”
Yeah, me too. But... it will matter to many who he picks... and he needs every vote he can get, considering the massive election/voter fraud the Marxists already, no doubt, have planned to use against him in their panic.
As for your comment re: Adam was not deceived... he sure was... by Eve, which is exactly what Satan was counting on. And... it has been thus ever since...lol. Adam heard God say, clearly, don’t eat from that tree. So only blaming Eve is a bit of a cop-out, don’t you think?
I’m thinking the one teeny little mistake God may have regretted is... making human sex so... um.... ‘rewarding’. Adam knew which side of the bed (leaves pallet?) he wanted to wake up to. And I bet he already knew not to get Eve all PMSing.
What are you talking about. Women are easily deceived, this isn’t in biblical. Paul states it clearly. Did I say Adam didn’t sin?? This post regarding Kristi Noem. Women do not lead like men
My point was Eve was deceived and we females are easily led by emotions. Therefore she would not be q good choice.
I'm shocked that I forgot to mention her speaking abilities. Socrates himself would be humbled listening to the brilliance of her oratory!
DeSantis got those things (COVID, trans) right, but he won’t run with Trump (and there are problems since they live in the same state), so whoever Trump picks got those things wrong, or might have if they were governors.
Think that was Wyoming... he moved from Dallas.
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