Noem’s daughter Kassidy Peters attended a 2020 meeting with the governor and top officials, including state Labor Secretary Marcia Hultman, triggering a complaint from former South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg. Both Noem and Ransborg, who was later impeached over killing a man in a car crash, are Republicans.
Ravnsborg alleged that Noem violated state laws on malfeasance, using public money, and conflicts of interest, in a complaint made public for the first time on Friday.
His only proof was an article from the Associated Press, which claimed that South Dakota officials were preparing to deny Peters’s appraiser application before the meeting.
Hultman, an appointee of former Gov. Dennis Daugaard, later told a state Senate committee that the Department of Labor has not issued any denials, and that the goal is to set a path forward if an applicant fails an initial exam.
After Peters failed the first exam, officials arranged such a path for her, Hultman testified. That plan “had been determined prior to the meeting,” Hultman said. Sherry Bren, a labor worker who later filed an age discrimination complaint against the department and was also at the meeting, also said that an agreement was hammered out before the meeting, though she also said that the details were changed afterward.
An agreement between Peters and the state previously released by Peters under pressure from state lawmakers says that Peters had to complete two classroom courses and re-submit three appraisals in order to obtain a license.
Bren has said the meeting was provoked by proposed findings of facts and conclusions of law mailed to Peters in July 2020. That document has not been released.
Bren, said she was intimidated during the meeting but that it was ultimately up to Hultman to make decisions on potential appraisers. Bren eventually reached a $200,000 settlement with the South Dakota government.
Peters has since left the appraising field, saying the investigation caused her reputation too much harm.
In a motion to dismiss released Friday, Noem said that the complaint was driven by political animus because she supported Ravnsborg’s impeachment and that the allegations were shown to be faulty in the testimony from Hultman and Bren.
“While the Complaint could be dismissed on that basis alone, there are several other legal deficiencies that require this Board to dismiss the Complaint outright before even addressing the merits,” she said. The state’s Constitution not allowing the board to adjudicate allegations of misconduct against the governor is one of them, she said.
Noem’s office did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.
Ian Fury, a spokesman for Noem’s campaign, said in a statement that the actions taken by the board “did not follow state law or precedent” and that the board has “yet to point to one single statute the Governor has violated in either of these complaints.”
Noem was also subject to a complaint for allegedly misusing a state airplane. That complaint is still being considered.
“It is unfortunate the board chose not to bring this charade to an end today. Kassidy Peters did not receive any special treatment, and Governor Noem followed the law, period!” Fury added.
The ethics board (GAB) told The Epoch Times via email that it has “acted in accordance with [state law] Chapter 3–24 to resolve this complaint and released the information allowed under the laws governing the GAB.”
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