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    Where will abortion be on the ballot in the 2024 US election?

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    This November, abortion will be on the ballot in 10 states, including the states that could determine the next president.In the two years since the US supreme court overturned Roe v Wade, abortion has become the kind of issue that decides elections. Outrage over Roe’s demise led Republicans to flounder in the 2022 midterms, and abortion rights supporters have won every post-Roe abortion-related ballot measure, including in red states such as Ohio, Kentucky and Kansas.This year, most of the ballot measures are seeking to amend states’ constitutions to protect abortion rights up until fetal viability, or about 24 weeks of pregnancy. Because a number of the measures are in states that have outlawed abortion, they could become the first to overturn the post-Roe ban. Others are in states where abortion is legal, but activists say the measures are necessary to cement protections so they can’t be easily overturned if Republicans control the government.These are the states slated to vote on abortion this election day.ArizonaAbortion rights supporters in Arizona, a key battleground state in the presidential election, are vying to pass a measure that would enshrine the right to abortion up until viability in the state constitution. A provider could perform an abortion after viability if the procedure is necessary to protect the life or physical or mental health of a patient.Arizona currently bans abortion past 15 weeks of pregnancy. Earlier this year, the state supreme court reinstated a 19th-century near-total abortion ban, generating nationwide outrage that prompted the state legislature to quickly repeal it in favor of letting the 15-week ban stand.ColoradoColorado’s measure would amend the state constitution to block the state government from denying, impeding or discriminating against individuals’ “right to abortion”. This measure also includes a one-of-a-kind provision to bar Colorado from prohibiting healthcare coverage for abortion – which could very well pass in the deep-blue state.Because Colorado permits abortion throughout pregnancy and neighbors five states with bans – Oklahoma, Texas, Arizona, Utah and Nebraska – the state has become a haven for people fleeing abortion bans, especially those seeking abortions later in pregnancy.FloridaOnce the last stronghold of southern abortion access, Florida in May banned abortion past six weeks of pregnancy, which is before many women know they’re pregnant. Its measure, which needs 60% of the vote to pass, would roll back that ban by adding the right to an abortion up until viability to the state’s constitution. Providers could perform an abortion after viability if one is needed to protect a patient’s health.Florida Republicans’ tactics in the fight against the measure has alarmed voting rights and civil rights groups. Law enforcement officials have investigated voters who signed petitions to get the measure onto the ballot, while a state health agency has created a webpage attacking the amendment.MarylandLegislators, rather than citizens, initiated Maryland’s measure, which would amend the state constitution to confirm individuals’ “right to reproductive freedom, including but not limited to the ability to make and effectuate decisions to prevent, continue, or end the individual’s pregnancy”. Like Colorado, Maryland has become an abortion haven because it permits the procedure throughout pregnancy. It is also relatively close to the deep south, which is blanketed in bans. MissouriAbortion opponents went to court to stop Missouri’s measure from appearing on voters’ ballots, but the state supreme court rejected their arguments and agreed to let voters decide whether the Missouri constitution should guarantee the “fundamental right to reproductive freedom, which is the right to make and carry out decisions about all matters relating to reproductive healthcare, including but not limited to prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion care, miscarriage care, and respectful birthing conditions”.Missouri, which was the first state to ban abortion after Roe fell, only permits the procedure in medical emergencies. If the measure passes, it is expected to roll back that ban and permit abortion until viability.MontanaIn the years since Roe fell, Montana courts and its Republican-dominated legislature have wrestled over abortion restrictions and whether the right to privacy embedded in Montana’s constitution includes the right to abortion. Abortion remains legal until viability in Montana, but the measure would amend the state constitution to explicitly include “a right to make and carry out decisions about one’s own pregnancy, including the right to abortion” up until viability. Providers could perform an abortion after viability to protect a patient’s life or health.NebraskaNebraska, which bans abortion past 12 weeks of pregnancy, is the lone state with two competing ballot measures this November. One of the measures would enshrine the right to abortion up until viability into the state constitution, while the other would enshrine the current ban. If both measures pass, the measure that garners the most votes would take effect.NevadaAlongside Arizona, Nevada is one of the most closely watched states in the presidential election. Its measure would amend the state constitution to protect individuals’ right to abortion up until viability, or after viability in cases where a patient’s health or life may be threatened. Nevada already permits abortion up until 26 weeks of pregnancy.New YorkNew York state legislators added a measure to the ballot to broaden the state’s anti-discrimination laws by adding, among other things, protections against discrimination on the basis of “sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive health”.Although sky-blue New York passed a law protecting reproductive rights in 2019, advocates say this measure could be used to defend abortion rights against future challenges. However, the ballot language before voters will not include the word “abortion”, leading advocates to fear voters will not understand what they are voting on. Democrats pushed to add the word “abortion” to the description of the measure, but a judge rejected the request, ruling that the amendment poses “complex interpretive questions” and its exact impact on abortion rights is unclear.South DakotaSouth Dakota’s measure is less sweeping than other abortion rights measures, because it would only protect the right to abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy. Under this measure, South Dakota could regulate access to abortion “only in ways that are reasonably related to the physical health of the pregnant woman” in the second trimester of pregnancy. In the third trimester, the state could ban abortion except in medical emergencies. Right now, South Dakota only allows abortions in such emergencies.Although this measure will appear on the ballot, there will be a trial over the validity of the signatures that were collected for it. Depending out the outcome of the trial, the measure – and any votes cast for it – could be invalidated. More

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      Early Voting Begins in Minnesota, South Dakota and Virginia

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      Early voting began in Minnesota, South Dakota and Virginia on Friday, letting voters in those states cast ballots while Election Day remains a month and a half away, on Nov. 5.All three states began sending out mail ballots on Friday, and residents now have the option of voting in person. Minnesota and South Dakota are letting voters fill out ballots and turn them in at various locations, while Virginia has opened some polling locations.Historically, voters who were unable to make it to the polls on Election Day had to request absentee ballots. But mail and absentee ballots now function effectively the same in many states. The terminology used varies; Minnesota, South Dakota and Virginia mostly refer to early voting ballots as absentee.None of the three states are must-win battlegrounds, most of which start in-person early voting in October. Read more about important dates and deadlines, and ways to access information about the voting process in your state.MinnesotaVoters can complete paper ballots in person or request mail ballots through an online form or by mail. The ballots can be submitted in person at designated voting locations, which include municipal buildings, public libraries and community centers. Ballots that are mailed in must be received by Election Day.South DakotaSouth Dakotans can complete paper ballots in person at their local county auditor’s office during business hours or request to have them mailed. All mail ballots must be received by the end of business on Nov. 4, the day before Election Day.VirginiaMany counties opened at least one polling location on Friday, including local general registrar’s offices. Not all polling locations are open yet. More will open through late October. Early voting ends on Nov. 2.Virginia voters can request mail ballots in person at the local registrar’s office, by mail or online through Oct. 15. Voters who request ballots after the deadline may still be eligible in cases of emergency or unexpected obligation. Mail ballots must be submitted in person by 7 p.m. on Election Day or, if submitted by mail, postmarked on or before Election Day and received by the registrar’s office by noon on Nov. 8.Taylor Robinson More

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      Official Kristi Noem social media accounts appear to have been deleted

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      Kristi Noem, the Republican governor of South Dakota who has been dogged by controversy since recounting how she chose to shoot dead a puppy and a goat, attracted new questions when it was noted that some of her official social media accounts appeared to have been deleted.On Monday, a link from Noem’s official website led to an error message on Facebook, which said: “This content isn’t available right now. When this happens, it’s usually because the owner only shared it with a small group of people, changed who can see it or it’s been deleted.”On Twitter/X, the governor’s site linked to Noem’s personal page. The official @GovKristiNoem page displayed the message “This account doesn’t exist”.A new X account, @GovNoemOffice, created this month, had 309 followers, far fewer than the roughly half-million of Noem’s old account.The new official account featured links to press releases.A small selection of followed accounts included Noem’s personal page, state government departments and Noem staffers including Mackenzie Decker, the director of policy who describes herself as “Living free in South Dakota with my husband and little girls. Fueled by Americanos, Cheezits and LaCroix Water. Mostly tweets about motherhood and the Jackrabbits”, the sports teams of South Dakota State University.Noem’s YouTube page was still active.Asked for comment, Noem’s spokesperson, Ian Fury, told the Guardian the new X page was the source for official updates. He did not say what happened to the old account or why it was deleted.Noem’s spokesperson, Ian Fury, told news outlets the new X page was the source for official updates but did not say what happened to the old account or why it was deleted. The Guardian contacted Fury for comment.Earlier this year, Noem was widely seen as a potential presidential running mate for Donald Trump.Such attention shone a spotlight on controversies including Noem using her personal X account to advertise a Texas cosmetic dentist and being banned from Native American reservations, over comments about tribal leaders and drug cartels.But then, in April, the Guardian obtained a copy of Noem’s book, No Going Back.The ensuing story revealed the governor’s startling account of the day she shot dead Cricket, a 14-month-old wirehaired pointer she deemed untrainable and dangerous, and an unnamed, uncastrated goat she said threatened her children.Asked why the book also included an apparent threat to kill one of Joe Biden’s dogs, Noem told CBS the animal, Commander, had “attacked 24 Secret Service people. So how many people is enough people to be attacked and dangerously hurt before you make a decision on a dog?”The book produced more damaging headlines when it was revealed that Noem claimed to have “stared down” the North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-un, but no such meeting could be shown to have happened. More

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      Floods Force Rescues in Iowa and South Dakota

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      Parts of the Upper Midwest remained under flood warnings on Sunday morning, after days of heavy rain pushed some rivers to record levels.More than a million people in the Upper Midwest were under flood warnings early Sunday morning, after days of heavy rain caused major flooding, forced evacuations and led to rescues in Iowa and South Dakota.The flood warnings were in place for rivers in parts of Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, Nebraska, South Dakota and Wisconsin. Some of the warnings were scheduled to end later on Sunday; others were in effect until further notice. A flood warning means that flooding is imminent or already occurring.In Iowa, several rivers have been peaking above levels reported during a 1993 flood that left 50 dead across the Midwest, according to that state’s governor, Kim Reynolds. She declared a disaster for 21 counties on Saturday, calling the flooding “catastrophic” on social media.In South Dakota, torrential rain has fallen across the central and eastern parts of the state for three days, and some areas have received up to 18 inches.Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota told reporters on Saturday that the worst flooding was expected to occur in the state on Monday and Tuesday as water coursed downstream and into rivers. She added that the Big Sioux River, one of the state’s major waterways, was expected to reach record levels.Other parts of the United States are grappling with a heat wave that has coincided with a spike in heat-related illnesses over the past week in some regions. Dulles, Va., and Baltimore are among the cities that have broken temperature records. Dangerously hot conditions were forecast for parts of Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania until Sunday evening, the National Weather Service said.The flooding in the Midwest has caused devastation in Rock Valley, Iowa, where the Rock River rose to a record level early Saturday. That led city officials to issue emergency evacuation orders for many of the city’s 4,000 residents. The city was without clean water because its wells had been contaminated by floodwaters, the local authorities said on social media.Sioux City Fire Rescue, which helped to evacuate people from Rock Valley, said on social media that many people and animals stranded in floodwaters in the city had been rescued by emergency teams with boats. In neighboring Nebraska, Gov. Jim Pillen said in a statement that he had authorized a military helicopter to help with search and rescue operations.Volunteers stacking sandbags in Hawarden, Iowa, a town of about 2,000 where some residents were evacuated.Tim Hynds/Sioux City Journal, via Associated PressAbout 15 miles southwest of Rock Valley, parts of Hawarden, Iowa, were also evacuated, city officials said on social media. Hawarden has a population of about 2,000.In Sioux Falls, S.D., emergency services rescued nine people from floodwaters, Regan Smith, the city’s emergency manager, said at a news conference on Saturday. Emergency services responded to five stranded drivers, 30 stalled vehicles in water, 10 calls about water problems and 75 traffic accidents, he added. More

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      Native tribes on banning Kristi Noem from reservations: ‘She’d be charged with trespassing’

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      While sifting through his work emails one February afternoon, Clyde Estes saw a message that dismayed him.“I started reading it and was just shocked,” recalled Estes, chairman of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe. “It’s something you don’t expect to see.”It relayed what Kristi Noem said at the state legislature just a few days prior. In her address at the state capitol, the second-term South Dakota governor blasted US immigration policy, saying that “invasion is coming over the southern border”. In that same speech, Noem pronounced: “Make no mistake, the cartels have a presence on several of South Dakota’s tribal reservations.”Noem alleged that tribal leaders in South Dakota were profiting off drug cartel activity. These remarks, and her controversial comments about Native children, have been met with staunch condemnation from Indigenous leaders, and have dredged up a bitter history between the tribes and the state.As a result, all nine of South Dakota’s federally recognized tribes, which cover more than 12% of the state, have now banned Noem from their reservations.After initially deciding against banning Noem in April, the tribal leaders of Lower Brule Sioux voted in May to go ahead. “There were a couple of fellow tribal council members who wanted an apology first, so we were holding out hope and got no reply from her at all,” said Estes.If the governor attempts to enter the reservation, Estes said that tribal law enforcement would notify county sheriffs and ask her to voluntarily leave the reservation.“She would be charged with trespassing,” said Estes, calling the situation “very, very unfortunate”.“We’re going to stand up to defend our people.”A vocal ally of Donald Trump, Noem was once considered a possible pick for Trump’s vice-presidential running mate. But her path to that role now seems more complicated following her revelation in her recent memoir that she killed her dog. Some see Noem’s focus on reservations as a political tactic.“She’s clearly trying to raise her profile as somebody who’s tough on the border, tough on crime,” said Chase Iron Eyes, a Lakota activist and attorney who is a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe. “She’s trying to use tribal nations as ploys for her political ambition.”The Oglala Sioux were the first tribe to ban Noem in 2019, the same year she began serving as South Dakota governor. Many tribes in the state, including the Oglala Sioux, had protested against the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, a controversial project that would transport oil from Canada to the United States while crossing major waterways that Indigenous tribes in South and North Dakota rely on. The protests, largely led by Native Americans, resulted in 761 arrests in a six-month period.Noem subsequently signed anti-riot legislation aimed to quash public protest, although it was later blocked. The Oglala Sioux Tribe said it felt targeted by the new law and it was “particularly offended” that Noem consulted with the pipeline company rather than the tribes.In February this year, the Oglala Sioux reissued a ban following her recent comments linking drug cartels to tribes in South Dakota. In March, Noem accused tribal leaders of “personally benefiting” from cartels.“If she claims to have evidence of tribal leadership involved in cartel activity, then make that evidence known,” said Iron Eyes.“None of the council or myself are aware of any relationship with any cartel,” said Estes.Frank Star Comes Out, president of the Oglala Sioux, has stated in the past that he believes cartels are active on tribal land. But tribes object to Noem’s suggestion that they are tied to the cartels – and say instead that the government is failing in its historic obligation to help tribes battle crime.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe Standing Rock Sioux, for instance, say tribes “ceded vast lands and resources” to the US in the 19th century in exchange for help providing law enforcement, among other things. Today, however, “on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, seven police officers patrol an area the size of two small states and serve a community of more than 12,000 tribal members and residents, needing at least 20 more officers to be fully staffed,” a tribal spokesperson said in a statement.Noem did not respond to questions about these issues from the Guardian, but her spokesperson shared a recording of a May press conference in which she said, in part: “Instead of working with me, many of them [tribes] have chosen to banish me, and I will ask them right back, why have they not banished the cartels? Why have they focused their attention on me, who has only offered them help, and not gone after those who are perpetuating violence against their own people?”She says the help she has offered includes a law enforcement course designed to train tribal officers and a law enforcement summit next week. The governor has also asked for audits of all federal funds given to South Dakota’s tribes to “verify the need for additional law enforcement resources”.‘Attacking Native children is wrong’Noem has criticized tribes on other fronts. “Not only is she impugning the reputations of tribal council members and elected leadership, she says that Native children are hopeless,” said Estes.In remarks during a March town hall in Mitchell, South Dakota, Noem alleged that Native children “don’t have any hope”, in the context of commenting on limited access to education and jobs on reservations. She added: “They don’t have parents who show up and help them.”For some, Noem’s comments about Native American children touch on a fraught history.Thirty federal boarding schools operated in South Dakota between 1819 and 1969 that separated Native children from their parents, forced cultural assimilation and punished kids for speaking Indigenous languages.“My mom went to one of these boarding schools. A lot of abuse took place there, a lot of forced removal of children,” said Iron Eyes. “In South Dakota, boarding school was a euphemism for a place where they erase who you are as a Native person.”The South Dakota governor has since doubled down on her comments about cartels on tribal lands on social media.“Instead of apologizing, she seems to be convincing herself that what she’s doing is not wrong,” said Chase Iron Eyes. “That attacking Native children is not wrong, saying they’re hopeless is not wrong.”There have been no publicly reported accounts of Noem attempting to enter reservations, which have their own law enforcement, in the wake of the bans. When asked what state police would do in such a situation, a South Dakota highway patrol spokesperson said: “We decline to answer a hypothetical question.” More

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      Andy Kim wins Democratic primary in race for Bob Menendez’s Senate seat

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      Democratic congressman Andy Kim has won New Jersey’s Senate primary, putting him in strong position for the general election in the blue-leaning state, though the win comes a day after Democratic senator Bob Menendez filed to run as an independent amid his federal corruption trial.Menendez, who has denied allegations that he accepted bribes to promote the interests of the Egyptian government, has chosen not to seek the Democratic Senate nomination. Kim’s win comes after a bruising battle that led New Jersey first lady Tammy Murphy to withdraw from the race in March.But Menendez has not opted out of the Senate race entirely, as he officially filed for re-election as an independent candidate on Monday, allowing him to continue raising money, which can be used to help cover his hefty legal bills, but his chances of victory in November appear non-existent. According to a poll conducted by Fairleigh Dickinson University last month, Menendez is only attracting 6% or 7% of the vote in hypothetical general election match-ups.In the Republican Senate contest, hotelier Curtis Bashaw defeated Mendham Borough mayor Christine Serrano Glassner.Bashaw centered his campaign in part on ending “one-party monopoly” in New Jersey, where state government is led entirely by Democrats, and on sending a conservative to Washington. It’s unclear whether that message will resonate with general election voters, who have not elected a Republican to the Senate in more than five decades. Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by about 1 million in New Jersey.Menendez’s legal troubles have also jeopardized the political future of his son, freshman congressman Rob Menendez. Hoboken’s mayor, Ravi Bhalla, has launched a primary challenge against Rob Menendez in New Jersey’s eighth congressional district, and the two candidates have nearly matched each other in fundraising hauls. Though Rob Menendez has not been implicated in his father’s alleged crimes, Bhalla has focused his campaign messaging on the need to crack down on corruption and to “return power to the people”. The winner of the primary is overwhelmingly favored to win the general election in November, as the Cook Political Report rates the district as solidly Democratic.New Jersey voters were also picking House candidates, with some of the most closely watched races having some tie to Menendez.In the eighth district, US representative Rob Menendez, the son of Senator Menendez, won his Democratic primary over Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla.Rob Menendez said Bhalla’s heavy focus on his father showed he was afraid to take on the representative directly.Menendez, an attorney and former Port Authority of New York and New Jersey commissioner, first won election in northern New Jersey’s eighth district in 2022, succeeding Albio Sires.He has been a lonely voice of support for his father amid his legal woes.The eighth district includes parts of Elizabeth, Jersey City and Newark.In the third district, Assemblyman Herb Conaway won the Democratic primary to succeed Kim.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBeyond New Jersey, four other states – Iowa, Montana, New Mexico and South Dakota – and Washington DC have primary elections on Tuesday. In Iowa, two House Republicans – Mariannette Miller-Meeks in the first district and Randy Feenstra in the fourth district – have drawn primary challenges. Feenstra’s district is viewed as safely Republican in the general election, but the Cook Political Report rates Miller-Meeks’ seat as likely Republican, creating a potential opportunity for Democrats in November.In Montana, the Republican governor, Greg Gianforte, faces a primary challenger, and the winner of that race will likely compete against first-time Democratic candidate Ryan Busse, a former firearms executive turned gun industry critic, in November. But Busse will face an uphill battle in the gubernatorial race, as Donald Trump won Montana by 16 points in 2020.Despite Montana’s Republican leanings, Democratic incumbent Jon Tester is keeping the Senate race close as he seeks a fourth term. In the general election, Tester will likely compete against Republican Tim Sheehy, a businessman and former Navy Seal who is widely expected to win his party’s Senate nomination on Tuesday.New Mexico’s incumbent Democratic senator, Martin Heinrich, is running unopposed in his primary, and he will go on to face off against Republican Nella Domenici, former chief financial officer of the hedge fund Bridgewater Associates. The Cook Political Report rates New Mexico’s Senate race as solidly Democratic, but one of the state’s House races is viewed as among the most competitive in the nation. Freshman Democratic congressman Gabe Vazquez will have a rematch against former Republican congresswoman Yvette Herrell in New Mexico’s second congressional district, after he defeated the then incumbent by less than one point in 2022. Both Vazquez and Herrell are running unopposed in their primaries, so they are already gearing up for the general election.While much attention will be paid to congressional primaries on Tuesday, all five voting states and Washington DC will simultaneously hold their presidential primaries as well. Biden and Trump have already secured enough delegates to lock up their parties’ nominations, but the results on Tuesday will offer some of the first insight into Republican primary voters’ views following the former president’s felony conviction in New York last week.Although former UN ambassador Nikki Haley dropped out of the Republican presidential primary in March, she has continued to win support in recent contests. In Maryland’s Republican presidential primary last month, Haley won nearly 23% of the vote. Leaders of both parties will be watching closely to see how Haley’s vote share might rise – or fall – after Trump’s conviction, and her performance could offer significant clues about the electorate heading into the general election.Associated Press contributed to this report More

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      Man who allegedly rammed Trump sign at police on January 6 arrested by FBI

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      The FBI has arrested a South Dakota man on charges that he stood among the first participants in the January 6 insurrection, allegedly breaking police lines and ramming a large sign toward officers during the riot.William Knight, 37, of Rapid City, faces two felony charges of obstructing law enforcement and resisting or impeding officers, the justice department announced on Thursday. He also faces five misdemeanor charges, including engaging in violence on the day supporters of Donald Trump tried to derail certification of his defeat to Joe Biden in the 2020 election.He was arrested by the FBI on Sunday and was expected to make his first appearance in court on Thursday.Knight was featured prominently in several videos that were taken during the riot, helping the FBI build its case against him. Investigators were able to match Knight’s appearance in his videos to his state driver’s license, which prominently shows tattoos on his neck.Prosecutors accuse Knight of being one of the first rioters to breach a restricted perimeter at the Capitol on January 6. Multiple times, he gestured aggressively and threateningly toward officers. He broke police lines and was sprayed with a chemical spray at one point, but he kept pursuing officers, prosecutors say.“We ain’t leaving! We ain’t going nowhere!” Knight could be heard yelling at police in one of the videos, according to court documents. “Here are the bitches. Here are the bitches.”At one point, documents say, Knight and a large group of rioters picked up a giant metal-frame “TRUMP” sign and rammed it toward officers. After, he allegedly shoved a police officer and removed barriers that police had put in front of the crowd.He allegedly continued to chant “Stop the steal!” with other protesters, referring to Trump’s lies that electoral fraudsters rigged Biden’s victory.Knight’s case is being prosecuted by the US attorney’s office in Washington DC and the justice department.Nearly 1,500 individuals have been charged in nearly all 50 states for crimes related to the January 6 insurrection, according to the justice department. More than 100 of those people have been sent to prison for sentences ranging from a few days to 22 years, the length of the Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio’s sentence from last fall.The US supreme court is expected to rule soon on whether the justice department can prosecute rioters on an obstruction statute.A decision against the department could jeopardize the prosecution of hundreds of defendants who received obstruction charges. More

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      ‘She’s in the pantheon now’: Kristi Noem and the politicians who hit self-destruct

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      She could have been a contender. But then she wrote a book. And suddenly Kristi Noem was caught like a rabbit – or a rambunctious puppy – in the headlights.The governor of South Dakota found herself insisting that a false claim she met the North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un had been put in her book by accident. Wait, said Elizabeth Vargas of NewsNation, you recorded the whole audiobook version and read this passage out loud. Why didn’t you take it out then?Noem blinked, nodded and waffled. She was pressed on the point twice more. Finally she asked in desperation: “Did you want to talk about something else today?”It was a car crash interview at the end of a train wreck week. Noem went on to abruptly cancel further appearances on CNN and Fox News, sparing herself further vilification over both the Kim lie and an admission that she had once dealt with a misbehaving puppy by shooting it dead in a gravel pit.Branded a fabulist and a dog murderer, her hopes of becoming Donald Trump’s running mate in the 2024 presidential election lay in ruins. Noem had become the latest in a long line of politicians – from Gary Hart’s affair to Sarah Palin’s gaffes to Mark Sanford’s cover up – to perform a spectacular act of self-immolation.“She’s in the pantheon now,” said Rick Wilson, a strategist who has worked on many Republican election campaigns. “The arrogance of a lot of political candidates who think they’re good with the press is they’re good with the press until they realise they’ve been skating on thinner and thinner ice and, when that ice goes, they are under the water.”The rise and fall of Kristi Noem happened with dizzying speed. The rancher and farmer served in the South Dakota legislature for years then entered Congress in the rightwing populist Tea Party wave of 2010. She became South Dakota’s first female governor in 2019 and won plaudits from Republicans for resisting coronavirus pandemic lockdowns.View image in fullscreenIn 2022 Noem published a book, Not My First Rodeo, with a front cover that shows her wearing a cowboy hat on horseback, reins in one hand, giant American flag in the other. “From humorous barnyard battles with feisty cattle and rodeo horses … ” was part of the PR pitch. The book seemed to shore up her status as a serious player in the Make America Great Again (Maga) universe.There were concerns over Noem’s hardline stance on abortion and media reports of an affair with the former Trump aide Corey Lewandowski. But in February this year, when the Conservative Political Action Conference held a straw poll for Trump’s vice-presidential pick, she came in joint first with Vivek Ramaswamy among 17 possible candidates.But things began to unravel when Noem appeared in a bizarre infomercial-style video lavishing praise on a team of cosmetic dentists in Texas. Then she went a book too far. In No Going Back, as first reported by the Guardian, she wrote that she took Cricket, her 14-month-old wirehaired pointer, on a bird-hunting trip with older dogs in hopes of calming down the wild puppy.Instead Cricket chased the pheasants, attacked a family’s chickens during a stop on the way home and then “whipped around to bite me”, she recalled. Later she led Cricket to a gravel pit and killed her. For good measure, she added that she also shot a goat that the family owned, claiming that it was mean and liked to chase her kids.Although Trump once famously asserted that he could shoot someone on New York’s Fifth Avenue and not lose any voters, it soon transpired that shooting a dog is the last taboo of American politics, the one sacrilegious act that Democrats and Republicans can unite to condemn in an otherwise hyper-partisan time.Joe Biden’s re-election campaign posted on social media a photo of the president strolling on the White House lawn with one of his three German Shepherds. The Democrat Hillary Clinton reposted a 2021 comment in which she warned: “Don’t vote for anyone you wouldn’t trust with your dog.” She added now: “Still true.”The former Republican House speaker Newt Gingrich told the Politico website: “Killing the dog and then writing about it ended any possibility of her being picked as VP.” The far-right extremist Laura Loomer, a Trump devotee, posted on X: “Wow. No coming back from this. This is so heartless. She killed a puppy? As a dog lover, that is just too much for me.”What was she thinking? Some speculated that, because the story has circulated for years among state politicians that Noem killed a dog in a “fit of anger” – and there were witnesses – she was going public now because she was being vetted as a candidate for vice-president.Others felt sure it was a misguided attempt to curry favor with Trump, who admires “killers” and has no love of dogs. Wilson, a co-founder of the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group, said: “Writing about killing a dog was not about writing about killing a dog for her.“Corey Lewandowski or someone around her told her: you need to show Trump that you’re tough and mean and bad, you can do the hard thing, you can be the one who would never be like Mike Pence, you can be counted on by Trump to be as brutal and ugly as he needs, no matter what the order is.”View image in fullscreenHe added: “That’s why she wrote that way, to say, I’d kill a puppy and isn’t that good enough for you, Donald? But even Donald Trump, who hates dogs, hates bad PR more. Kristi Noem became the definition of bad PR.”Then came the catastrophic book tour. Noem gave interviews on CBS, NewsNation, Newsmax and Fox Business, where the normally Maga-friendly Stuart Varney pushed her on the dog story until she snapped: “Enough, Stuart. This interview is ridiculous – what you are doing right now. So you need to stop.”Wilson commented: “By the third or fourth day of her getting humiliated over and over again in public, even I felt like somebody should put her out of her misery and take her to the gravel pit and end this pain. She was absolutely just flailing at every moment and did not have a sense of clarity.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“If you’re on a PR tour trying to appeal to the Maga base, there is this belief in the Maga world that you never ever apologise, never say you were wrong, never back down. But unfortunately that’s not how humans work. Even in the Maga media space, she started getting her head caved in on this thing and rightly so. She deserved it.”Noem faced a particular grilling over the passage in her book that stated she remembered meeting Kim: “I’m sure he underestimated me, having no clue about my experience staring down little tyrants (I’d been a children’s pastor after all).” She subsequently conceded that no such encounter took place and promised to correct later editions.Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, said: “Being a woman in the Republican party, she wanted to project the image of toughness and she’s trying out for the position of running mate. It’s not really the dog; the giveaway is Kim Jong-un. That could have been any foreign leader.“Why did she pick and lie about meeting Kim Jong-un? Because she remembered the ‘love affair’ between Trump and Kim Jong-un, so she thought that Trump would be particularly impressed if she met and talked with him. That’s something they have in common – except they don’t.”Noem is not the first American politician to push the self-destruct button.View image in fullscreenEarl Butz, a secretary of agriculture, was on a flight after the 1976 Republican National Convention when he said: “I’ll tell you what the coloreds want. It’s three things: first, a tight pussy; second, loose shoes; and third, a warm place to shit.” The remark was reported in the media, prompting a reprimand from the then president, Gerald Ford, and the resignation of Butz, who claimed “the use of a bad racial commentary in no way reflects my real attitude”.The senator Gary Hart, the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1988, told a reporter: “Follow me around. I don’t care. I’m serious. If anybody wants to put a tail on me, go ahead. They’d be very bored.” The Miami Herald duly did watch Hart, who was married, and report that he spent a night with a young model named Donna Rice. He withdrew from the race.John Edwards, a young and charismatic star of the Democratic party, ran for president in 2008 while conducting an affair and fathering a child with a woman even as his wife was battling cancer. The scandal was exposed and destroyed his political career.The Republican Sarah Palin was John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 election but became a liability with gaffes revealing her lack of foreign policy experience or knowledge of the supreme court. Asked what newspaper or magazine she regularly reads, Palin replied: “Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me all these years.”Mark Sanford was the governor of South Carolina when, in 2009, he flew to Argentina to be with a woman who was not his wife but told his staff he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. The deceit was quickly uncovered, made vivid headlines and ended his 20-year marriage.View image in fullscreenSanford told the Guardian this week: “The reality of life is ups and downs and I think the measure of all of us is how we respond to the down more than the up. The record stands for itself in terms of I was honest and laid my cards out on the table and dealt with things as they came and that’s best you can do in those situations.“Anybody who’s failed publicly at anything, if they’ve learned anything from it, they’ve learned to do exactly what the Bible says in not judging others. It’s just recognising the nature of the human condition is imperfect. Those who pretend to be most perfect aren’t and inevitably live in a glass house.”But Sanford admits that he is baffled how Trump, who faces 88 charges in four criminal cases, seems to get a free pass and is once again the Republican presidential nominee. “The higher you climb, the further you fall and, appropriately, there’s a magnifying glass that’s applied to people in public office that frankly ought to be there.“People shouldn’t be above the law and get away with things that other people don’t and there is an added level of scrutiny that that goes with public life, which may have something to do with the fact that we live in country of 330 million people and, remarkably, [Trump and Biden] are the best two folks the country has to offer on the Republican and Democratic side. Are you kidding me?”Other politicians undone by a fatal flaw include Andrew Gillum, Eliot Spitzer and Anthony Weiner. Some appear destined to fly too close to the sun. Sabato commented: “They want it all and they’re used to being very lucky. That’s what does them in. They assume they’re going to continue to be lucky. That’s fatal for anybody. If you’re lucky, go have a drink but don’t expect to get lucky every day. It doesn’t happen.” More

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      South Dakota to decide on abortion rights in fall as ballot initiative advances

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      South Dakota voters will decide on abortion rights this fall, getting a chance at direct democracy on the contentious issue in a conservative state where a trigger law banning nearly all abortions went into effect after Roe v Wade was overturned.The state’s top election official announced on Thursday that about 85% of the more than 55,000 signatures submitted in support of the ballot initiative are valid, exceeding the required 35,017 signatures.Voters will vote up or down on prohibiting the state from regulating abortion before the end of the first trimester and allowing the state to regulate abortion after the second trimester, except when necessary to preserve the life or physical or emotional health of a pregnant woman.Dakotans for Health, which sponsored the amendment, said in a statement on Thursday that the signatures’ validation “certified that the people of South Dakota, not the politicians in Pierre, will be the ones to decide whether to restore Roe v Wade as the law of South Dakota”.Abortion rights are also on the ballot in Florida and Maryland, and advocates are still working toward that goal in states including Arizona, Montana and Nebraska in the aftermath of the US supreme court’s 2022 reversal of Roe.Voters in seven other states have already approved abortion access in ballot measures, including four that wrote abortion rights into their constitution.South Dakota outlaws all abortions, except those to save the life of the mother.Despite securing language on the ballot, abortion rights advocates in South Dakota face an uphill battle to success in November. Republican lawmakers strongly oppose the measure, and a major abortion rights advocate has said it doesn’t support it.The American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota warned when the signatures were submitted that the language as written does not convey the strongest legal standard for courts to evaluate abortion laws and could risk being symbolic only.Life Defense Fund, a group organized against the initiative, said it will continue to research the signatures.Opponents still have 30 days – until 17 June – to file a challenge with the secretary of state’s office. More