Dana Hess writes for South Dakota Searchlight, an online news organization.

It looks like hard work has paid off for the state’s Democratic Party as it gets ready to field its biggest slate of legislative candidates in recent memory. This may not mean the end of Republican super-majorities in the Legislature, but it’s the best shot that Democrats have had to whittle away at the GOP’s lead in legislators and earn some standing when it comes to making decisions about the future of the state.

In the 2024 legislative session, there were four Democrats in the 35-member Senate and seven Democrats in the 70-member House. These lackluster numbers are a direct result of the state party’s inattention to candidate recruitment in the last few election cycles.

According to the Secretary of State’s website, this year Democrats are fielding 19 Senate candidates and 33 House candidates. This showing affords Democrats a better chance of increasing their numbers in Pierre. While the party leaders can take credit for recruiting more candidates, it’s still a long way from fielding a full slate of 105 candidates. Republicans, on the other hand, have ceded only one Senate race to Democrats and failed to field candidates for just two House races.

A South Dakota Searchlight story quoted a couple of longtime political watchers who gave the Democrats credit for fielding more and better candidates this year. Of course it’s up to the voters to decide if that’s true.

From a numbers standpoint, Democrats are fielding 52 candidates. With 33 House candidates, they have automatically ceded control of the House to Republicans. In the Senate, Republicans aren’t assured of a majority with Democrats fielding 19 candidates, nine more than in 2022. Democrats have a decent chance to make inroads in the Senate as 10 Republican senators are retiring.

While more Democratic candidates are welcome on the ballot, this is in no way meant as an endorsement of any Democratic ideals, policies or candidates. It is an endorsement of a better way of civic life when the wants, needs and future of the state are debated by candidates who come at the issues from opposite points of view.

For its part, the state’s Republican Party seems to never have met a primary election challenge it didn’t like. With 44 contested races to qualify for the Republican ballot, there will certainly be plenty of GOP-on-GOP squabbling before the June 4 primary. Those debates, however, are largely between candidates who agree on basic issues all the while trying to enhance their conservative bona fides.

That’s nowhere near the kind of debate that South Dakotans need as they vote for candidates in November who will set the course for the state’s immediate future.

It’s hard to tell what Democratic Party officials were thinking in the last few election cycles as they allowed so many ballots to have blank spots where there should have been Democratic candidates listed. This year’s showing was better, but Republicans are still in line to automatically be gifted 16 Senate seats and 37 House seats without a challenge from Democrats.

Democrats look forward to the day when they are more than just an afterthought in legislative proceedings. Obviously the state’s Democratic Party has a long way to go, but this year’s crop of legislative candidates is likely to help provide for the kind of lively debate on the issues that South Dakotans deserve during an election.