Attorney general of South Dakota wins election to US House

South Dakota’s Republican attorney general was elected to the state’s only U.S. House seat on Tuesday.

Marty Jackley led his Democratic opponent, Nikki Gronli, 65% to 35% when The Associated Press called the race at 10:03 p.m. Central time with 43% of the votes counted statewide.

Jackley will take over in January for the departing Republican Rep. Dusty Johnson, who unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for governor in the June primary election.

The 56-year-old Jackley has been attorney general since 2022 and previously served as attorney general from 2009 to 2019, following a stint as U.S. attorney for South Dakota. When he leaves the Attorney General’s Office in January, he’ll be succeeded by Republican Lance Russell of Hot Springs, who ran unopposed for attorney general on Tuesday.

Gronli previously served as director of rural development for the U.S. Department of Agriculture during President Joe Biden’s administration and as vice chairperson of the South Dakota Democratic Party.

Polling commissioned by South Dakota News Watch and the Chiesman Center for Democracy showed 61% of likely voters still did not recognize Gronli’s name as of three weeks ago, while 60% recognized Jackley from his many years in statewide office. Jackley also out-fundraised and outspent Gronli, and had a built-in advantage with Republican voter registrations that outnumber Democrats 2-to-1.