State Rep. Brandei Schaefbauer, R-Aberdeen, speaks on the South Dakota House floor on Jan. 17, 2024. (Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight)
In recent years it felt like the rest of the world was going crazy. There were conspiracy theories about the weirdest things: Barack Obama’s birth certificate, the existence of a deep state that secretly controls the federal government, Donald Trump’s supposed fight against a Satanic group of child molesters.
Surely, these theories sprang from the cities where the friction of daily life in such confined quarters led people to believe the oddest things. Out here on the prairie, where there’s plenty of room to roam, we seemed immune to those ideas. We seemed safe from conspiracy theories.
Those days are over, if they ever existed.
For me, the first hint that South Dakotans could be just as addled as the rest of the nation came in 2022. In one of the first commentaries ever published by South Dakota Searchlight, the writer described how he tried and tried to get secretary of state candidate Monae Johnson to admit that she believed the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. He likened her artful dodging of his questions to trying to nail Jell-O to a tree.
As a story, an election denier running for an office that oversees elections had a certain man bites dog quality to it. As an indication of what was to come, having a Republican candidate for statewide office embrace a conspiracy theory was just the tip of the iceberg.
In 2023 the Legislature considered House Concurrent Resolution 6006 that called for the fair treatment of the Jan. 6, 2021, defendants who besieged the United States Capitol. Sponsored by Rep. Phil Jensen, a Rapid City Republican, the resolution was based on the conspiracy theory that those prisoners endured inhumane conditions; were subjected to cruel and unusual punishment; and were deprived of adequate food, medical care and access to religious services and attorneys.
Concurrent resolutions don’t have the weight of law, but are a reflection of the mood of the Legislature. The House State Affairs Committee wasn’t in the mood, defeating the resolution 12-0. That doesn’t change the fact that an elected representative sought to give a conspiracy theory legislative legitimacy. Since President Trump pardoned the insurrectionists, don’t be surprised if a new resolution comes along, asking for reparations for the Jan. 6 “patriots.”
Meanwhile, the conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was somehow stolen from President Trump caused a flurry of activity in South Dakota as “election integrity” backers made life miserable for county commissions across the state and pressured lawmakers to do more to make sure that the state’s already squeaky clean elections were beyond reproach. In effect, a conspiracy theory has led to an unneeded movement that still has momentum.
The level to which conspiracy theories have been accepted among elected leaders in this state can be found in an episode of the Ken Matthews podcast, which was called out for criticism on the South Dakota War College website. In that episode, Matthews interviewed Aberdeen Rep. Brandei Schaefbauer, a Republican majority whip in the House. In the last legislative session, Schaefbauer sponsored House Concurrent Resolution 6009, which sought to have the attorney general file a lawsuit against China to seek damages related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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China, however, isn’t the only pandemic culprit, as Schaefbauer told Matthews. Referencing the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Anthony Fauci, Schaefbauer said, “He should be on death row for killing millions and millions of people.”
She also had something to say about the way the Trump administration is handling the Jeffrey Epstein files, which have been the topic of conspiracy theories about underage girls provided to high-ranking officials. Schaefbauer said “if something doesn’t happen” to satisfy people calling for the Epstein files, “there is going to be, I believe, a revolt of the American people. Because they have, I mean, we have all been promised that something is going to happen, and we get this little, you know, give us this little nugget, and then it’s a pacifier for us. Well, no, I think the way things are going — people are so upset and they have nothing else to lose — so why not let’s just start, you know, a civil war again.”
There you have it, a call to civil war by a leader in South Dakota’s Republican Party. That almost makes Johnson’s refusal to answer questions about who won the 2020 election seem quaint and harmless.