Bob Mercer does the people’s work compiling all of the posted campaign finance totals for contested Legislative seats—total receipts, total spending, and total cash on hand, sorted by chamber, district, and party. Wow—why can’t the Secretary of State do that?
Mercer’s excellent crystallization of the state of Legislative campaign finance allows us to see at a glance how the unusually high number of independent candidates are doing relative to their partisan opponents. Of the eleven independents included in Mercer’s report, three have raised and spent five-figure sums.
The biggest independent spender is Joe Flood from Manderson. Flood has raised $81,029 and spent $72,263 on his bid for District 27 House. But Flood is no Brian Bengs bringing in money from lots of enthusiastic donors. Flood’s pre-general filing shows that he’s fueling his campaign with $70K of his own money and $5K from his mom in Massachusetts. I have no problem with money from moms or Massachusetts; I’m just pointing out that Flood’s rock-star fundraising and spending, the highest in any race listed by Mercer for any candidate of any party (the only candidate close is Republican Representative Taylor Rehfeldt of Sioux Falls with $69,913 raised and $45,582 spent), is not a result of a groundswell of support but an effort to buy that groundswell.
Flood is swamping his four District 27 opponents. Incumbent Rep. Liz May from Kyle raised only $1,100 and spent only $500 from the end of May to the middle of this month, but she, like Flood, reports over $7,000 in cash on hand. The three independents in the race are worse off: Elizabeth Lone Eagle from Kyle got four contributions totaling $600 but couldn’t figure out anything to do with that money, while Evangeline Poor Bear from Pine Ridge and Jay Yohner from Martin reported zero money in and zero money out. Money isn’t everything, but if you’re not getting people to back your campaign with cash and spending that money on at least a few signs and buttons and flyers, you’re not fulfilling your obligation to get out and educate and mobilize the electorate.
The second-biggest-money independent is District 8 House candidate Clint Hoyer from Winfred, who has raised $23,405 and spent $19,680 to challenge Republican incumbent Senator Casey Crabtree from Madison, who raised $33,500 and spent $40,073 pre-general. Like Flood, Hoyer has gotten the majority of his money, $14K, from in-house, in this case from family member Jane Hoyer. But unlike Flood, Hoyer has received over $9,400 from a respectable array of in-district rural neighbors. Hoyer has thus raised more money from outside his own and his family pockets than any other independent Legislative candidate…
…except for Bryan Breitling of Dell Rapids, who is actually a stalwart Republican looking to take the District 25 Senate seat back from the angry-dad/nutbar wing of the SDGOP. Breitling raised $37,925 and spent $21,591 pre-general. None of that money appears to have come out of his family pockets. Instead, Breitling fielded donations from a whole slew of the top-line GOP donors—Lee Schoenbeck, Robert Fouberg, Senator Michael Rohl, Jim Thares, Kevin Schieffer, Jeff Erickson, Scott Stern, Kim Malsom Rysdon, Matt Michels, Charlie Hoffman (hey! at least one right-wing wild man in the establishment crowd!)—as well as a glittering array of establishment PAC money—ethanol, healthcare, contractors, retailers, PAC’n Heat, and the personal PACs of Dusty Johnson and Dennis Daugaard. Breitling’s poor Republican opponent, Bart Sample, raised $9,550 and spent $4,135. Bart’s wife Cassandra loaned him $900. Sample raised a handful of local money, got $2,050 from the Moody and Davison County GOPs, and drew $4,750 from whackadoodle PACs Liberty Tree, SD Freedom Caucus, and The People First.
The other independents are lagging in fundraising and spending. Democratic and apparently Republican defector Peri Pourier has raised and spent less her Democratic and Republican opponents in the District 27 Senate race. Sam Froehlke is at the bottom of the four-candidate heap in the District 4 House race (where Democrat Emelia Enquist outraised Republicans Fred Deutsch and Ryan Kohl pre-general!). Neal Tapio is nowhere near his two Republican opponents in the District 5 House race. Garrett Heinz is behind Republicans Dick Werner and incumbent Spencer Gosch in the low-cash-energy District 23 House race. And everybody is outraising and outspending sam Hare Jr. in the District 32 House race.
For the most part, the eleven independent Legislative candidates show that absent deep personal pockets and connections with a party apparatus, it’s hard to assemble the resources to wage a competitive campaign.