South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

January 2026

1st Amendment Minnehaha County Sheriff Mike Milstead Sioux Falls

Picking Replacements

l3wis 3Comments

I have complained about outgoing Councilors and School Board members recruiting replacements in the past, now it is moving to the Sheriff’s office;

Captain Josh Phillips launched his campaign for Minnehaha County Sheriff after receiving an endorsement from Sheriff Mike Milstead on Wednesday.

I found it funny that just a few hours after Mike announced his retirement Josh had all his paperwork ready to announce his candidacy. Mike announced his retirement on the Belfrage show and I was actually listening live because Belfrage is my morning laughs. Then a few hours later Josh announces.

Obviously Mike brought Josh in on his retirement before announcing because Josh had all his paperwork ready to file. It was a bad look. I would have waited a week.

Josh does have a lot of experience, but I hope he has a challenger because this statement had me automatically NOT voting for him;


“I believe deeply in conservative South Dakota values, respect for the Constitution, and responsible use of taxpayer dollars. I will use my experience to keep our neighborhoods safe,” says Capt. Phillips.

Hey Josh, not all SD values are conservative. My grandparents on both sides were proud SD Dems, and they weren’t radical left lunatics. Sioux Falls and Minnehaha County are very purple, and when you say crap like this, you lose a lot of voters. I am hoping someone from out of state runs that has lived here for a few years and has actual law enforcement experience outside of this county.

As for Mike, he has been a good sheriff. I actually interviewed him for the blog several years ago, and it was probably one of my best interviews. Him and his wife, a former legislator, really turned MAGA the last couple of years and I do know they have lost a lot of political friends because of it. Which is unfortunate.

I was disappointed that Mike stooped to the recruitment politics, but when you run government in a state of paranoia, these are the people we get. They are so afraid their non-vetted replacements will uncover their misdeeds they have to find a replacement that will be complicit on their past. It’s local weasel politics at it’s best and worst.

1st Amendment Donita Trump Noem Gun Control Kristi Noem

More lies from the Noem

l3wis 8Comments

I was watching a segment tonight about Noem and the 2nd Amendment and comments she made in her book;

Like most stuff in the book, total BS. I will confess I didn’t read the book, because ghost written books by politicians is usually boring and conflated, and I know all I need to know about Noem. But I found the above statement hilarious because it couldn’t be farther from the truth.

I participated in the BLM rally, I walked for a couple hours downtown but didn’t follow the protest to the Mall where a couple of latch key kids threw some pebbles at the police. Never saw a single biker all day. There was a motorcycle gang in Sioux Falls, but they weren’t the kind of gang that you want showing up to a BLM rally to protect police. I saw about a dozen of them hanging out DTSF the day before wearing their colors and jackets. They seem to be focused on drinking beer and not protecting police. They were a chapter of major criminal gang. There is also a rumor circulating that this gang was actually in town to commit burglaries during the protests. That one has been hard to prove since there is NO transparency in the police department. I also remember a flyer circulating on Facebook that a school bus full of Anti-Fa was coming from Fargo. That was pretty funny and surprised Noem didn’t reference it in the book. The day was beautiful and full of love. Like I said, I never made it to the mall, but the time I participated it was peaceful. There was NO bikers and NO anti-fa at the rally. The only problem was a couple of 8 year old boys that were bored at the mall, but that doesn’t make for an interesting narrative.

1st Amendment Downtown Sioux Falls Homeless SF City Council Sioux Falls

National Community Survey; ADDRESS HOMELESSNESS

l3wis 3Comments

I have received the comments from the NCS. The city provided them. I have to reformat them before I post, but after a quick review I was surprised by how many people commented about the transient problem DTSF, this is just one of many;


I am not typically insensitive to such things or unthoughtful about the words I choose but it must be said. Bums have taken over downtown. I have lived here most of my 41 years and have not seen anything like it before. Covid hit and it’s like we now tolerate vagrancy. Even as folks are investing hundreds of millions of dollars into making this the showpiece of our city, we are just overrun with bums. Sure there’s mental health and addiction issues but a lot of it is just bums. I saw someone sleeping on Phillips Ave in front of the old Visnu Bunny space at 9am on a weekday. Why do they feel comfortable doing that? There should be a multi-pronged effort to squash this immediately. Make laws that empower police to push back against panhandling. Offer transients bus tickets to leave the city. Put constant pressure on those who haunt DT and litter and generally degrade our quality of life. Why would the behavior of a couple hundred people be allowed to ruin the heart of a city that hundreds of thousands of people.

A multi-prong approach would require multiple agencies working together within the city. I know, laughable.

Not a lot of solutions offered but it was most certainly the NUMBER one topic in the comment section.

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