South Dakota
Amendment H: Opposing sides differ on the likely outcomes of open primaries • South Dakota Searchlight
Supporters of open primaries say shifting to a top-two primary system will whittle candidates down to those who represent a majority of South Dakota voters. But opponents argue it will limit voters’ choices each November.
Amendment H, one of seven statewide questions on South Dakotans’ Nov. 5 ballot, proposes opening up future primary elections and placing all candidates, regardless of party, on a single ballot. The top two vote-getters would advance to the general election.
Currently, only registered Republicans are allowed to vote in Republican primaries. Democrats and independents can vote in Democratic primaries.
The measure would amend the state constitution to implement the change. A “yes” vote supports replacing partisan primaries with a top-two system for all state and local offices. A “no” vote opposes the initiative and keeps South Dakota’s current primary system in place.
Sioux Falls businessman and longtime Republican Joe Kirby leads South Dakota Open Primaries. He hopes the reform increases voter turnout so independents get a “meaningful vote” and candidates change primary campaigns to appeal to all voters.
Washington became the first state to adopt a top-two primary system in 2004, but wasn’t able to implement it until 2008 due to court challenges. California adopted the system in 2010 and implemented it in 2012. Nebraska uses a top-two primary system for state legislative offices, and does not list political parties because the Legislature is nonpartisan.
Both the South Dakota Republican Party and the South Dakota Democratic Party oppose the measure. Democratic Party Executive Director Dan Ahlers said the amendment would not significantly affect voter turnout or candidate moderation.
Increasing voter turnout?
Proponents of Amendment H point to the South Dakota June 2024 primary’s 17% voter turnout — the lowest in recent history — as a reason to switch to a top-two system. In a Republican-leaning state, the primary is more important to many Republican candidates than the general election, even though about half of South Dakota registered voters can’t cast their vote in Republican primaries.
Aside from this year’s primary — which included no statewide races, one Democratic legislative primary and 44 Republican legislative primary races — voter turnout in South Dakota primaries increased over the last decade.
Kirby said a top-two primary would significantly increase voter turnout because it would allow “meaningful” primaries for non-Republican South Dakota voters.
Citing a fiscal estimate from the Legislative Research Council, Kirby said voter turnout would grow by 50,000 voters — which would have increased turnout from 17% to 25% in this year’s primary, or from 32% in 2022 to 40%.
But Ahlers said that estimate is taken out of context. The Legislative Research Council merely estimated the number of extra ballots needed for primaries, not the actual turnout.
“They always have to put a buffer number in there,” he said.
If Amendment H passes, Ahlers doesn’t expect voter turnout to increase significantly. It’s not a primary model that will draw people out to vote but rather the candidates and the issues, Ahlers said. That’s the responsibility of parties, he said, to recruit quality candidates and encourage people to vote.
Average voter turnout in Washington has been lower in some years since the adoption of open primaries, including 31% in 2014, and higher in others, including 54% in 2020. Turnout has been similarly mixed since the implementation of open primaries in California, ranging from 25% in 2014 to 48% in 2016, and never yet equaling the state’s modern, pre-open-primaries high of 58% turnout in the 2006 primary.
Michael Ritter, an assistant professor specializing in election research at Washington State University, said that “more accessible primaries” do boost primary turnout, generally. Open primary models can make voting more accessible to citizens, and it may also increase a person’s commitment to political advocacy, he said.
But, Ritter said, open primary models don’t boost turnout by 10% or more. Just by a few percentage points, or less than 5%.
“That may sound trivial, but it can be important because a lot of elections in this country are decided at the margins,” Ritter said.
Appealing to all South Dakota voters or limiting their options?
Kirby said a top-two primary system shifts away from “party control” and encourages candidates to appeal to all South Dakota voters rather than just a party.
“It’s better to empower the voters of the state,” Kirby said. “Parties will no longer be in control of elections. The voters will be.”
Ahlers said the constitutional amendment is pushed by Republicans who are “frustrated with their own party.” He said the amendment will “disenfranchise voters” because a top-two system could limit the political diversity of candidates on the general election ballot. Two Republicans could appear on the general election ballot rather than a Republican with a Democrat, Libertarian and independent.
“You hear the word ‘open’ and you think, ‘Great. An open process where everyone can participate.’ But this limits your choices. It limits the opportunity for more voices to be heard,” Ahlers said.
In California, the top-two system has motivated new kinds of political strategizing.
Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Adam Schiff ignored his two Democratic opponents in this year’s primary and instead focused attention on Republican candidate Steve Garvey, even though Garvey has little chance at winning the general election in the Democratic-leaning state. That strategy helped Schiff maneuver Garvey into position as Schiff’s preferred general election opponent, a CalMatters columnist wrote earlier this year. Instead of appealing to moderate voters, Schiff made a partisan appeal to manufacture a relatively easy campaign for himself in the general election.
“Gamesmanship happens in politics,” Kirby countered. “That’s not at all a flaw in the open primary system.”
Republican Rep. Bethany Soye, of Sioux Falls, who opposed Amendment H during a recent debate at the Downtown Sioux Falls Rotary, said the top-two system will make it harder for independent or “grassroots” candidates to run for office because campaigning will be more expensive. They’ll run against more opponents and have a longer campaign cycle, which will “guarantee the perpetual rule of big money” in South Dakota, Soye said.
“The general election is going to be in June and there will never be another independent candidate on the ballot in November,” Soye said.
Washington’s primary came under fire this year as a “bloody mess” because the ballot had an overwhelming number of candidates, wrote a Seattle Times columnist. There were 28 candidates listed on the ballot for governor alone.
There is no limit in Amendment H on the number of candidates that can run in a primary. Kirby said the South Dakota Legislature can address that concern if the measure passes, such as setting the number of petition signatures needed to file a candidacy at a higher level to discourage frivolous campaigns.
The potential for a legal challenge
The attorney general’s explanation of Amendment H notes that the amendment might be challenged in court, but doesn’t say why. The office did not respond to questions from South Dakota Searchlight.
Ahlers dislikes another portion of the amendment’s language, which says “a candidate may select the name of a political party to be listed next to the candidate’s name on the primary ballot.” Ahlers said that provision “encourages voter deception” by allowing candidates to identify with a party even if they aren’t registered with that party.
While candidates can already register under one party and then switch registration once elected, Ahlers said that’s harder to pull off under the current system.
Kirby said if someone is “misrepresenting themselves,” political parties and the media will hold them accountable. He said it hasn’t been an issue in other states.
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RAPID CITY, S.D. (KOTA) – More road work and travel impacts are set to begin across western South Dakota this week, with projects ranging from highway striping and crack sealing to temporary rest area closures as well as an upcoming public meeting on a bridge replacement project in Keystone.
The first projects begin Monday, May 11.
S.D. Highway 44: Striping work
On S.D. Highway 44, crews will complete striping work from about 1.5 miles east of Farmingdale to roughly 10.75 miles east of the community.
Work is scheduled from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday and is expected to continue through Tuesday evening. Drivers should expect daytime lane impacts in the area.
U.S. Highway 385: Striping work
Also beginning Monday, striping operations are scheduled on U.S. Highway 385 from about one mile south of the U.S. Highway 85 junction near Deadwood to the junction itself. Work is expected to take place during daytime hours Monday through Tuesday.
Pavement preservation project on S.D. Highway 20
A pavement preservation project is also scheduled to start Monday on S.D. Highway 20 between Buffalo and Camp Crook. Crews will be sealing cracks in the roadway as part of the project. Traffic will be reduced to one lane during daytime hours, with flaggers and a pilot car guiding motorists through the work zone. Delays of up to 15 minutes are expected.
The contractor for the $112,155 project is Highway Improvement, Inc. of Sioux Falls. The overall completion date is scheduled for Dec. 4.
Drivers are reminded to slow down and use caution around crews and construction equipment in all work zones.
Wasta rest area spring cleaning
Additional travel impacts are expected latter this week with temporary closures planned at the Wasta Rest Areas along Interstate 90 for annual spring cleaning.
The eastbound Wasta Rest Area near mile marker 98 will close at 7 a.m. Tuesday, May 12, and reopen at 9 a.m. Wednesday, May 13. After that reopening, the westbound rest area will close from 9 a.m. Wednesday until 9 a.m. Thursday, May 14. Travelers are encouraged to make alternate plans during the closures.
Public meeting on future bridge replacement project along U.S. Highway 16A in Keystone
On Thursday, May 14, the South Dakota Department of Transportation and Complete Concrete, Inc. will host a public informational meeting on a future bridge replacement project along U.S. Highway 16A in Keystone.
The open house-style meeting will run from 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Keystone Community Center, 1101 Madill St. Officials say the meeting is intended to provide project details and answer questions from residents, businesses and emergency personnel.
The bridge replacement project is scheduled to begin in October. Plans call for replacing the existing bridge with a box culvert and include additional improvements such as intersection upgrades, resurfacing, pavement markings, traffic signals, ADA upgrades and erosion control. Pedestrian access on both sides of the structure will also be improved.
More information on the Keystone project is available at South Dakota Department of Transportation’s project page.
Current road conditions, closures and construction updates can be found at SD511 or by dialing 511.
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Copyright 2026 KOTA. All rights reserved.
The South Dakota Lottery offers multiple draw games for those aiming to win big.
Here’s a look at May 10, 2026, results for each game:
Winning Millionaire for Life numbers from May 10 drawing
01-03-20-35-46, Bonus: 05
Check Millionaire for Life payouts and previous drawings here.
Feeling lucky? Explore the latest lottery news & results
Are you a winner? Here’s how to claim your prize
- Prizes of $100 or less: Can be claimed at any South Dakota Lottery retailer.
- Prizes of $101 or more: Must be claimed from the Lottery. By mail, send a claim form and a signed winning ticket to the Lottery at 711 E. Wells Avenue, Pierre, SD 57501.
- Any jackpot-winning ticket for Dakota Cash or Lotto America, top prize-winning ticket for Lucky for Life, or for the second prizes for Powerball and Mega Millions must be presented in person at a Lottery office. A jackpot-winning Powerball or Mega Millions ticket must be presented in person at the Lottery office in Pierre.
When are the South Dakota Lottery drawings held?
- Powerball: 9:59 p.m. CT on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
- Mega Millions: 10 p.m. CT on Tuesday and Friday.
- Lucky for Life: 9:38 p.m. CT daily.
- Lotto America: 9:15 p.m. CT on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.
- Dakota Cash: 9 p.m. CT on Wednesday and Saturday.
- Millionaire for Life: 10:15 p.m. CT daily.
This results page was generated automatically using information from TinBu and a template written and reviewed by a South Dakota editor. You can send feedback using this form.
South Dakota
After Standing Rock, could a canceled mine project offer a roadmap for opponents of a new oil pipeline in South Dakota?
Almost exactly a decade since the start of the Standing Rock protests against the Dakota Access pipeline gained national and international attention, new disputes are simmering over tribal rights in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
Earlier this month, an environmental organization and a Native American advocacy group sued the US Forest Service, claiming that an exploratory graphite drilling project on national forest land threatened a recognized ceremonial site on mountain meadows known as Pe’ Sla, or Reynolds Prairie.
But on Friday, Pete Lien and Sons, the company behind the project, abruptly withdrew, saying it would perform reclamation on the site and would not seek to file another plan. The decision came as a striking victory for Native American tribes and environmental groups that had opposed it – but other projects in the works may not meet the same conclusion.
The project, claimed nine groups within the Sioux Nation, including the Standing Rock Sioux, would “directly and significantly” affect the use of Pe’ Sla, which sits within Ȟe Sápa, the Lakota name for the sacred Black Hills of South Dakota, itself the locus of Lakota creation myths.
A second exploratory project by a Canadian company looking to mine uranium on state-owned land could affect Craven Canyon, an area that contains 7,000-year-old sites of importance to Indigenous tribes, historians and archaeologists.
Opposition to the twin projects – backed by Pete Lien, of Rapid City, and by Clean Nuclear Energy Corp – comes as a proposed Alberta-to-Wyoming pipeline for carrying Canadian crude oil to the US is close to securing commitments from oil companies after Donald Trump granted permitting through an executive order.
All the projects have at their heart issues of extraction, water safety and sacred sites, much as the Standing Rock dispute of 2016 that saw “water protesters” gather in a standoff with law enforcement over concerns regarding water safety and sacred sites.
That case began when the Standing Rock Sioux passed a resolution stating that “the Dakota Access Pipeline poses a serious risk to the very survival of our Tribe and … would destroy valuable cultural resources” and was a violation of the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty guaranteeing the “undisturbed use and occupation” of reservation lands surrounding the pipeline.
In the aftermath, the environmental group Greenpeace was ordered to pay damages of $345m by a North Dakota judge to pipeline company Energy Transfer and subsidiary Dakota Access in connection with the protests, an order that is set to go to appeal. Greenpeace claims the legal action is designed to silence activists.
Most of the current disputes relate to energy, reflecting the Trump administration’s drive toward US energy independence and away from dependence on foreign sources, particularly China. Graphite, used in electric vehicle batteries, is almost exclusively imported. Roughly 95%–99% of uranium is purchased from foreign sources, including Russia and Kazakhstan.
The pipeline deal, meanwhile, is expected to help increase oil output from Canada, the world’s fourth-largest producer, to around 6.1m barrels a day, up from 5.5m now. Bridger, the company behind the Alberta-to-Wyoming pipeline, has said the project was being developed in response to identified market interest.
Wizipan “Little Elk” Garriott, a member of NDN Collective, an Indigenous rights group opposing the mining at Pe’ Sla, says the entire process of approval for the planned mine “happened in the dark”.
“There was no notice that they were proceeding provided to us, nor to the sovereign tribal nations,” he says, in violation of environmental and cultural impact study requirements and consultations with the tribes.
Lilias Jarding, director of the Black Hills Clean Water Alliance, one of the parties in the victorious Pe’ Sla action, says the decade since Standing Rock has seen a huge growth in projects attempting to mine tribal lands and areas of ceremonial significance.
Since the start of the second Trump administration, the push for both minerals extraction and energy has dramatically increased. “They’re being more aggressive,” Jarding says. In the case of Pe’ Sla, he adds, the company didn’t stop drilling when the lawsuits was filed: “They started drilling 24 hours a day.”
The alliance, along with tribes, claim the graphite project violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) and that the US Forest Service improperly used a process known as a “categorical exclusion” to bypass reviews.
Oglala Sioux president Frank Star Comes Out said in a statement that the Sioux tribes never ceded to the US the lands in the Black Hills, which, he said, “remain the spiritual center of the Great Sioux Nation and they are not for sale, lease or exploitation” and that the lawsuit is a “united tribal response to protect a sacred site from those who continue to desecrate our ancestral lands”.
Oglala activist Taylor Gunhammer said that drilling at Pe’ Sla was akin to “drilling under the Vatican or at a sacred site in Jerusalem”.
A representative of Clean Nuclear Energy Corp, Mike Blady, said the company was “aware of the cultural significance and are doing everything in our power to ensure that there is no collateral damage”.
Will this amount to a populist action similar to Standing Rock?
The Pe’ Sla dispute did not provoke the kind of Indigenous-led, grassroots resistance to fossil-fuel infrastructure projects that accompanied the Dakota Access pipeline, which in some ways became a template for contemporary protests, powered by social media, celebrities and politicians.
The tribes were not in favor of following in that direction, Jarding says: “It’s a deeply sacred spiritual and ceremonial site, and elders have made it clear that it’s not a good place for another Standing Rock with thousands of people. They say this is not the place.”
Under the Biden administration, the tribal groups felt they were entering into a period of co-management policy over federal lands that in many cases lie within treaty agreements. But under the Trump administration, that sense of co-operation has diminished.
“We’ve seen a ramp-up of opening up federal lands for mineral and gas exploration, but as a planet we need to be moving away from fossil fuels and toward policies that are sustainable into the future,” says NDN’s Garriott.
What was planned for Pe’ Sla now, or was happening at Standing Rock a decade ago, or has indeed happened over a long history of disputes between sovereign tribal groups and the US government, he says, is “protecting our land and protecting our water, not only for ourselves but for the planet. We’re not random protesters out there – we’re protecting our own land”.
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