Reps. Jon Hansen, R-Dell Rapids, and Karla Lems, R-Canton, will run alongside one another within the 2026 gubernatorial race. They kicked off their marketing campaign in Sioux Falls on April 24, 2025, on the Army Heritage Alliance. Hansen will run for governor with Lems operating for lieutenant governor. (Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight)
Dissatisfaction with the “establishment” is driving Jon Hansen and Karla Lems to run for South Dakota governor and lieutenant governor, they stated.
The pair formally introduced their 2026 marketing campaign to a whole bunch of supporters Thursday on the South Dakota Army Heritage Alliance in Sioux Falls. The group included property rights advocates towards eminent area for carbon dioxide pipelines, “election integrity” activists and over a dozen Republican lawmakers.
Hansen, who at present serves as state Home speaker, will search the Republican Get together’s nomination for governor, with Lems, his second in command within the Home, operating to function his lieutenant governor.
The 2, together with audio system who launched them, stated elected officers too typically put the “folks’s pursuits” second to particular pursuits. To resounding applause, they stated that’s prompted a wave of opposition to institution politicians, a referred state pipeline regulation that voters rejected in November, and ousted incumbent state lawmakers in final June’s major election.
“Grassroots patriots from all throughout the nice state of South Dakota are standing up and we’re saying in report numbers, ‘No extra corruption, no extra waste and abuse, no extra tax on our land and our liberties and our lifestyle,’” Hansen stated to the group. “At this time renews the approaching of the tip for all of that.”
Tons of of South Dakotans attend a kickoff occasion on the Army Heritage Alliance in Sioux Falls on April 24, 2025, the place Jon Hansen and Karla Lems introduced their bid for governor and lieutenant governor for the 2026 race. (Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight)
If elected, Hansen pledged to “clear up” the system by reducing state authorities and spending. He additionally promised to create “training selection grants” for various and personal faculty training, and signal an government order to “outline man and lady, finish the woke and restore frequent sense.” Hansen stated he plans to cease providing “company welfare” as nicely.
Republican governors and lawmakers for many years have invested hundreds of thousands of tax {dollars} in bonds, loans and grants to entice companies to construct and develop within the state. That features funding for farmers and value-added operations, in addition to assist for bigger investments equivalent to Tru Shrimp.
Hansen cited the Tru Shrimp deal for example of “company welfare.”
State and native officers dedicated $6.5 million in taxpayer cash for a low-interest mortgage six years in the past for Tru Shrimp to construct a facility in Madison. The corporate has not constructed the power, regardless that it was anticipated to break floor in 2024. The corporate, which has since modified its title to Iterro, introduced it’s “greater than midway” to its fundraising aim to start the Madison undertaking earlier this yr.
“I feel it’s simply pointless authorities mingling, and it’s dangerous enterprise, they usually’re losing our taxpayer {dollars} to do it,” Hansen stated of the deal. “It’s that form of stuff that we need to say ‘no extra’ to. Let’s simply get again to the free market, low tax and low regulation.”
A Dell Rapids lawyer, Hansen has spent a decade within the South Dakota Home of Representatives. The 39-year-old was elected Home speaker for the newest legislative session after serving as speaker professional tempore from 2021 to 2022.
Lems, from Canton, owns a espresso store and property administration enterprise. The 56-year-old entered the state political fray in 2022 and was elected as Home speaker professional tempore throughout the newest legislative session, the primary lady to carry the place in state historical past.
The 2 are using the momentum of personal property rights and anti-abortion successes within the final yr.
Reps. Jon Hansen, R-Dell Rapids, left, and Karla Lems, R-Canton, converse to the press after they introduced they’re operating alongside one another within the 2026 gubernatorial race. They kicked off their marketing campaign in Sioux Falls on April 24, 2025, on the Army Heritage Alliance in Sioux Falls. Hansen will run for governor with Lems operating for lieutenant governor. (Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight)
Each have been main forces on property rights within the Legislature, culminating in an eminent area ban for carbon seize pipelines signed into regulation this yr. The laws contributed to the Public Utilities Fee’s latest denial of Summit Carbon Options’ second allow utility to construct a portion of its $9 billion pipeline by means of the state.
Hansen would typically be launched as “our governor” throughout rallies in opposition to Summit’s pipeline. He instructed attendees on the occasion Thursday that below his management, the “solely factor that’s going to get sequestered are leftist local weather insurance policies” — a reference to Summit’s deliberate underground “sequestration” of carbon dioxide in North Dakota. In the meantime, Republican President Donald Trump championed carbon seize and storage this week, highlighting it as a part of his agenda to enhance American power manufacturing.
When requested about Trump’s assist of carbon sequestration, Hansen stated “on the subject of taking folks’s land and utilizing it with out their consent to be able to construct a dangerous pipeline throughout their property, that’s an enormous no.”
Rep. Jon Hansen speaks with an attendee after a Sioux Falls kickoff occasion April 24, 2025, for his marketing campaign for governor alongside Rep. Karla Lems, R-Canton, for lieutenant governor. (Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight)
Hansen has additionally targeted on anti-abortion laws and tightening South Dakota’s election legal guidelines within the Legislature. Now vp of South Dakota Proper to Life and co-chair of the Life Protection Fund, he organized a marketing campaign final yr that fended off a poll initiative to enshrine abortion rights within the state structure.
Hansen and Lems are the primary to announce their candidacy for the governor’s race, although different distinguished South Dakota politicians have stated they’re contemplating their very own bids, together with Republican Gov. Larry Rhoden and Republican U.S. Rep. Dusty Johnson. Different Republicans regularly talked about as doable candidates embody Legal professional Normal Marty Jackley, who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2018, and Aberdeen businessman Toby Doeden, who briefly thought of a run towards Johnson for U.S. Home final yr.
Rhoden, who previously served as lieutenant governor, modified the title of his marketing campaign fundraising committee to “Rhoden for Governor” in February. His lieutenant governor, Tony Venhuizen, created a brand new marketing campaign fundraising committee the identical month.
The Legislature modified the method for selecting lieutenant governor nominees this yr. The brand new regulation permits candidates for governor to decide on their operating mate, somewhat than counting on political occasion conventions to appoint them.
If a couple of individual from every occasion seeks the nomination, occasion voters will select their nominee for governor within the major election on June 2, 2026. The winners will advance to the overall election on Nov. 3, 2026.
Rhoden is at present serving the rest of the second time period gained by former Gov. Kristi Noem, who would’ve been term-limited on the finish of 2026. She resigned earlier this yr to just accept the highest job on the U.S. Division of Homeland Safety.
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