Larry Rhoden

Larry Rhoden is the Republican Governor of South Dakota and the party's nominee for a first full term. A West River rancher, he served in the Legislature and as lieutenant governor under Kristi Noem before succeeding her in January 2025.[1][4] He is running on keeping the state "strong, safe, and free," and names property tax cuts, defense manufacturing and rural health care among his priorities.[3][5]

Rhoden was born on February 5, 1959, in Sturgis and raised on a farm.[1] He graduated from Sunshine Bible Academy in 1977 and served in the South Dakota National Guard from 1978 to 1985.[1][4] While his children were young he served as a church trustee and on the local school board and led the board of directors for the area Cenex; he is a deacon of his home church, still does custom welding and operates the ranch where he was born.[4]

Rhoden was elected to the state House in 2000 and served there from 2001 to 2009, including four years as majority leader.[1][4] After he was term-limited, he served in the state Senate from 2009 to 2015, and he lost the 2014 Republican U.S. Senate primary to Mike Rounds.[1] He returned to the House in 2017 and served until 2019.[1] His office's biography says he chaired both the Senate and House State Affairs committees and worked with then-Representative Noem on property tax reform.[4]

In June 2018 Kristi Noem chose Rhoden as her running mate, and they were elected that November; they were re-elected in 2022.[1][4] He served as lieutenant governor from January 2019 and as interim secretary of agriculture in 2020, then as South Dakota's Agriculture Ambassador from 2020 to 2025.[1][4] He became the 34th governor on January 25, 2025, when Noem resigned to become U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security, and he later chose Tony Venhuizen as lieutenant governor.[1]

As governor, Rhoden signed a pair of property tax relief bills on March 12, 2026, SB 96 and SB 245, which supporters called the largest property tax cut in state history and critics called a tax shift onto sales tax.[2] He announced his 2026 candidacy in November 2025 and won the Republican nomination in South Dakota's first primary runoff, defeating Toby Doeden on July 28 with 70.8% of the vote.[1] In a September 2026 interview, he cited the state's Data Center Bill of Rights and a new women's correctional facility in Pierre, and listed expanding defense manufacturing through the South Dakota Defense Institute, property tax cuts and rural health care as top priorities.[5] Rhoden and his wife, Sandy, have four sons and ten grandchildren.[4]

Researched from the cited sources on 2026-10-21.