BELLE FOURCHE—An evening dedicated to learning more about the candidates running for Legislative District 28—South Dakota House of Representatives District 28B and Senate District 28—was held at Venue 519 on May 21. The primary is June 2.
The event focused on community interactions with the candidates as everyone in attendance was invited to ask a question. Hosted by the Butte County Republican Committee, Tom Brunner was the moderator for the evening. He not only asked questions, but spent time sharing his opinion on a variety of issues.
Brunner welcomed everyone to the forum. “Thank you for coming, and thank you to the Chamber for partnering with us on these events and doing the advertising. We really appreciate that. What we’ve got tonight is District 28 House candidates and Senate candidates…”
And with that, Travis Ismay, incumbent, and Larry Schmaltz, both running for House District 28B, spent time introducing themselves. Sam Marty, incumbent, and Ryan Maher, both running for Senate District 28, were up next. Maher introduced himself while Marty was unable to attend the event, so a statement was read on his behalf.
The first topic of discussion was brought up by Brunner regarding campaign mailers. He said, “Something I want to address, is anybody sick of getting these things in the mail? I’ll tell you what, you know, I know a lot of them are sent by, you know, third parties, whatever. To me they’re disgusting, and that’s not what South Dakota politics should be about, I think… To me, it’s disgusting because they’re bringing millions of dollars of out-of-state money into South Dakota to defeat good, hardworking candidates.” He went on to say when he was in the Legislature he was against sending out any negative ads. “To me, that’s just rotten campaigning, and I don’t know. I don’t appreciate it, and I don’t think anybody in here appreciates that either,” he said.
Then he asked the candidates, “So, maybe just address that… how you handled some of these facts that are filling our mailbox.”
“I’ve been doing this for quite a few years, and this is the first year that I have had more people meddling in a legislative campaign than I’ve ever seen before. Some of these mailers, I didn’t even know they had gone out. They don’t contact you, they just send them out, and you don’t even know they’re going out,” said Maher. “So, I mean, that’s the only thing you can do, is just call them and ask them not to do anything, and hopefully they don’t. So, yeah, and it’s all Facebook-driven. If you want to do something for your own sanity, turn off Facebook for the next two weeks!”
Schmaltz responded, “Yes, the postcards that I have sent out, they’re paid for by me and those went out, they were positive. I have not sent anything out negative. I’ve asked anybody that I’ve talked to or worked with—do not send anything out negative with my name on it. I don’t want any negative campaigning on that. There is one group that has sent something out, a postcard on my behalf that I didn’t know they were doing.”
“Well, I haven’t done a postcard, and I’m not gonna! If you get anything that says anything bad about my opponents, it wasn’t me, because I’m not going to do that. I would appreciate it too, if someone would stop sending me these things in my mailbox, because I just throw them away, and hopefully you guys do too,” said Ismay. “I’ve had a lot of negative against me too, but I mean, I kind of figure that’s the way politics works. I mean, it’s not like I’m not going to get any negative press. I think it’s ridiculous the amount of money that out-of-state PACs have been dumping into this thing, and I don’t understand, so I would suggest whoever’s doing that stop. Thank you.”
Deb Elliot printed out and distributed Pre-Primary Campaign Contributions Reported in May 2026. The report contained all of the contribution sources for each campaign. “I looked through the campaign finance reports with a fine-tooth comb, and I am sick to my stomach at what I see, and I put together a spreadsheet, and I printed out all four candidates’ campaign finance reports, so if you want to see copies, they’re in the back. I paid for copies, you can all see the evidence. I did a comparison, and I will ask you to talk about the results of this comparison, because I think it’s very telling …I’m so mad I am trying to stay calm, but it just makes me angry, because what it says is that we don’t have local control. If you are my representative, you’re not going to listen to me—you’re going to listen to the people who pay money,” she said.
Schmaltz replied, “Deb, I would never vote what’s not my conscience. You can scream all you want to, but you are absolutely wrong. I did not solicit any of the funds that I received. People looked at my business experience and decided that I was a good candidate and they wanted to support me for that reason. I will not vote against my conscience or my constituents. That’s just absolutely not who I am.”
“I have my morals, my standards, my Christian values—I’m a Catholic by trade, and I have that grounding, and I think I’ve shown that over the years that I’m not bought influence—I’m not going to trade a vote for $5 first, it’s illegal, but for $500 really, you’re going to sell your soul for $500? That goes against everything I believe,” explained Maher.
Ismay said, “I’d have to go back and look exactly, I’d have to figure out exactly who gave me the money, but the PACs that I was donated to were a lady that I met that liked how I voted in Pierre. She said we got a PAC and we really like you and you’re conservative and here is $1,000, and I’d have to look at all of them. I can explain all of them.”
And then Brunner shared his opinion, “I would just sum up—the groups that are in South Dakota, I mean, rural electrics, rural telephones, insurance, and things like that—I think that’s fine. Everybody here probably some way or another pays into those PACs and it’s good. It’s the federal PACs that I think Deb has the real problem with. And they have little ties to South Dakota, that’s big business, and they’re pouring millions of dollars—some of them are, and look on the reports of who’s funding some of these campaigns, and maybe we need to vote a little bit more with our feet and our dollars, and tell these businesses that are pouring millions of dollars that we don’t want to do business with them. They have no business, whether you’re on one side of the issue or whoever, they shouldn’t be affecting our campaigns the way they are.”
The evening was a night full of conversations and good questions asked by the public. Other questions included: how the candidates compare to Dusty Johnson; how do you plan to grow the workforce; what is your preferred method to lower property taxes; are you for or against keeping sales tax at 4.2 percent; how candidates feel about eliminating property taxes; why has the state budget increased; do they support I-27 running through Belle Fourche; and opinions on recalling a county commissioner, along with a few more topics.
Most of the opinions were along the same lines of agreement, but if you would like to watch the full answers of each candidate to all of the questions reported on here, there is a full video of the District 28 Candidate Forum on the Butte County Republican Committee Facebook page. Please look at it and be prepared to vote on June 2.
Upcoming primary election events scheduled in Belle Fourche include: Dusty Johnson will be at the Wild Magnolia on May 28 at 2:30 p.m. to meet with area voters. Later that same day, there will be a Forum to Address Data Centers, Butte County Initiated Measure A, at Venue 519, beginning at 6 p.m. There will be a balanced panel (for and against) the measure with the goal of providing solid, truthful information so that voters in Butte County can make an educated decision on Initiated Measure A on June 2.
See more pictures and read the full issue of the Belle Fourche Beacon by clicking here.
