How A South Dakota County Is Suppressing The Native American Vote
How A South Dakota County Is Suppressing The Native American Vote
by Kira Lerner Posted on October 24, 2014 at 10:29 am Updated: October 26, 2014 at 11:15 am
FORT THOMPSON, SOUTH DAKOTA — The Crow Creek Indian Reservation lies along the Missouri River in central South Dakota, an area marked by rolling hills of corn fields, a government-constructed dam and a Native American town centered around the tribe’s casino.
While South Dakotans across the state have been voting for weeks — the state offers 46 days of early absentee voting — the Crow Creek Sioux have yet to see their ballots. The closest early voting site is a 50 mile roundtrip away in Gann Valley, a town with a population of 14. The Buffalo County auditor, a white resident of the town, has refused to set aside federal funds to open a satellite office for early voting on the reservation this year.
That 50-mile trip is effectively impossible for many people on the reservation. Sixty-five-year-old Crow Creek resident Sylvia Walters lives in a government-subsidized apartment building for the elderly and disabled in Fort Thompson, the largest town on Crow Creek. She told ThinkProgress that because she doesn’t have a car, she has to pay someone to drive her if she wants to leave her immediate part of town. “I stay home a lot. Let’s put it that way,” she said. Although she plans on voting in November, she said she would have preferred having the option to vote early. “Sometimes you forget on the day or you’re busy,” she said. “This way when you’re thinking about it you can get it done.”
Native American voting rights group Four Directions has been fighting since 2002 to give Indians the same voting opportunities as other South Dakotans. Over breakfast at the Lode Star Casino in Fort Thompson, executive director OJ Semans, his wife Barb and Buffalo County Commissioner Donita Laudner told ThinkProgress the county’s refusal to open an early voting center is an attempt to suppress Native American votes.
More:
http://thinkprogress.org/election/2014/10/24/3583565/south-dakota-native-american-voter-suppression/
= new reply since forum marked as read
The County or State should provide a shuttle bus to Gann Valley and back twice a day from today till election day! Where's the Democratic Party in South Dakota? Where are the town elders? 
Boosted by a scandal, a new prairie populist is trying to sing his way to an upset.
snip//
The scandal, which needed no further explanation at the Chamberlain Country Club, was a byzantine affair that had engulfed the state’s high-price visa program. Known as EB-5, it was buoying every Democrat; it was doing the most by far for Rick Weiland. The former Tom Daschle staffer, who’s within single digits in the latest average of polls, bunched in with Republican Mike Rounds (who’d won two terms as governor) and independent Larry Pressler (a three-term Republican senator). Mayday, the “Super PAC to end Super PACs,” was on the air with $1 million of ads, and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee had followed.
snip//
“I usually ask people to give me nine bucks, to keep me on the road,” Weiland remembered. “She had a ten-dollar bill. I reached into my pocket to get a one. She said, ‘keep the change.’ That’s how George McGovern put this party together in the 1950s. That’s how Tom Daschle did it in 1978, a race that I worked on. You know why? You get to talk to people. Most people in this state think we should be expanding Medicaid. Most people in this state think we deserve a viable minimum wage. You go down the list. Giving people a fair shot—that’s what we’re all about, not a free lunch.”
I can’t run a $9 million campaign
but I don’t have EB-5 to explain
and heyyyy-ey! No one’s bought me!
Great article! Much more.. and more music vids from Rick Weiland.. Democratic US Senate Candidate.
https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/features/2014-10-17/in-south-dakota-rick-weiland-is-channeling-the-ghost-of-george-mcgovern
Seems Harry Reid wrote off this Senate Race and Rick Weiland's been on his own. Like Steve Hildebrand said in the article.. "When you’re looking at a close race to hold your majority, you don’t write any state off."
Just a couple of Rick Weiland's singing campaign songs across South Dakota
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Good Luck in South Dakota, Rick Weiland! GOTV2014
S.D.’s Rick Weiland — A True LGBT Ally in An Unlikely Place
http://southfloridagaynews.com/Guest-Columnists/column-s-d-s-rick-weiland-a-true-lgbt-ally-in-an-unlikely-place.html
Edit: for a link to donating to Rick Weiland.. just $5 bucks or $9..
to blue neen~ Mahalo!
https://secure.actblue.com/contribute/page/dkforrw
http://sync.democraticunderground.com/10025683078
Mahalo Judi Lynn~ Shame on Suppressing the VOTE of Native Americans or anyone!
