Mum’s the word: When questioned, Noem administration stays quiet

It may be best if journalists in South Dakota took a three-year break from asking questions of Gov. Kristi Noem or anyone in her administration. It would be less frustrating for them and they would likely have just as much information as they would if they kept asking questions for the last 36 months of the governor’s term. 

Lately noted for not being particularly forthcoming with the media, Noem hit a new low when she recently sent 50 South Dakota National Guard troops to the southern border of Texas and refused to provide any information about the deployment. 

According to a South Dakota Searchlight story, Noem’s office refused to answer questions about where the unit was from, what its mission was at the border, how long it would be deployed and what it would cost. The best her spokesman could do was direct reporters to the website of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, which was only slightly less vague about the deployment than Noem was. Noem’s spokesman said he couldn’t answer questions until the unit returned, for “operational security reasons.”

Once the members of the Guard returned, Noem was full of praise and let slip a few facts. The unit in Texas was the Alpha Battery 1st Battalion 147th Field Artillery of Watertown. Certainly keeping the identity of the Guard unit a secret kept the drug cartel assassins at bay. The cost of their deployment, kept under wraps until they got home for “security” reasons, was $850,000. 

This wasn’t the first time the Noem administration has invoked “security” as a reason to keep the public in the dark. Twice during the 2021 legislative session, bills were offered seeking the disclosure of the cost for providing security for Noem. At the time she was a rising star in the national Republican Party who traveled often to campaign for GOP candidates. While political campaigns covered her travel costs, her security detail was made up of South Dakota Highway Patrol troopers. 

Providing even an overall number for the cost of Noem’s security detail would give bad actors too much information, according to Craig Price, who at the time was the secretary of the Department of Public Safety. 

“We don’t talk about security,” Price told one of the legislative committees. That was good enough for the Republican majorities on two committees that killed the bills.

That year the Noem administration was equally opaque about her use of state airplanes, opposing a bill that would have called for a quarterly accounting of the purpose of a flight, passengers on board, cost of the flight, who paid for the flight and departure points and destinations. 

Officials who spoke against the bill offered two arguments against it. One, it would be too much work. And two, that information was already available. Republicans on the legislative committee taking testimony on the bill didn’t question that lack of logic when they voted to kill the legislation. 

The Noem administration has gotten even more tight-lipped recently as the governor refused to take part in the traditional weekly news conferences during the last legislative session. Another change in tactics calls for all reporters’ questions to be submitted in writing to a department’s public information officer who will, in theory, get answers from the proper sources. Often those queries are ignored or return with replies that don’t answer the original questions.

The edict that silence is golden was taken to new heights recently by Secretary of State Monae Johnson. A Dakota Scout story notes that she was questioned about the legality of petitions her office approved seeking to put a repeal of the state’s medical marijuana laws on the ballot. Rather than explain why the petitions were legal, as the state’s top election official should, Johnson’s office said it wouldn’t answer questions due to “a potential for litigation.”

Any reporter realizes that there are times when state government officials can’t talk about certain subjects. However, the information drought in the Noem administration does a disservice to anyone who is interested in the workings of their state government. Silence should be an exception. In Noem’s case, it’s the way she rules.