#1 is the best, #50 is the worst
Robert Skjonsberg has worked for Rounds for over a decade and is a registered South Dakota lobbyist for more than a dozen clients, among them Meta and Altria. Senate rules say a staffer at his pay grade may not affiliate with a firm that sells professional services — and he is listed as a co-owner of one.
Five weeks into the boat strike campaign, the Senate voted on whether to pull U.S. forces out of a fight Congress never authorized. It failed 48-51. Fourteen Republican senators we track voted no, and thirteen of them voted no every time it came up again.
The AP and the Guardian obtained a January 2019 letter in which Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asked Samoa's prime minister to let his team study the country's MMR vaccines. He told senators the trip had nothing to do with vaccines. Fourteen Republicans we track voted to confirm him.
Trump won South Dakota with 63.4% of the vote to 34.2%, a margin of 29.2 points, with 64.5% of eligible voters turning out. (Full 2024 presidential results, state by state.)
3 of 3 — 100%. In the U.S. House, South Dakota has 1 Republican and 0 Democrats; in the Senate, 2 Republicans and 0 Democrats. (Source: Current members of Congress from South Dakota, on Wikipedia.)
South Dakota ranks #31 of 50. That is the average of its rank on the 17 measures in the report card above — violent crime, gun deaths, life expectancy, food insecurity, maternal and infant mortality, household income, public education, voter turnout and more. #1 is the best state to live in, #50 the worst.
You can compare South Dakota directly to other states on our Compare States page.
We grade Republican incumbents running in 2026 — U.S. Senators, U.S. Representatives and governors — on their record: how they voted, who funds them, and what it has cost South Dakota. Democrats and independents do not get report cards.
The general election is Tuesday, November 3, 2026 — 53 days away. Check your registration and polling place at vote.org.