South Dakota Guard steps up to the plate

News that South Dakota will step up to the plate and send up to 50 of its National Guard members to Texas to help secure the border between the United States and Mexico should be a feather in our collective hats. Hopefully, other states will follow the lead of Gov. Kristi Noem who announced the news Tuesday.
The scheduled deployment is in response to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s request for help to respond to “ongoing violations of state and federal laws by illegal aliens crossing the unsecured border,” said the news release from the governor’s office. These ongoing violations are a direct result of the inept Biden administration’s refusal to stop the flow of illegal immigrants, drugs, gang members and Mexican cartels from invading our country through its open Southern border.
We applaud our governor for taking this bold action in response to a fellow Republican governor’s request to stop this insanity and stem the flow of this illegal activity at our Southern border. It is a crime that this administration has not taken action to secure the border and protect American citizens from this influx of illegal activity taking place at the border.
We are seeing not only Mexican citizens, but people traveling from all over the world come across our Southern border unimpeded. Estimates are that up to two million people from as far away as Venezuela, China and Russia will flow across our Southern border illegally this year if something is not done to stop it.
“The Biden administration has failed in the most basic duty of the federal government: keeping the American people safe,” said Noem. “The border is a national security crisis that requires the kind of sustained response only the National Guard can provide. We should not be making our own communities less safe by sending our police or highway patrol to fix a long-term problem President Biden’s Administration seems unable or unwilling to solve. My message to Texas is this: help is on the way,” the governor said.
Our message to Noem is, as Teddy Roosevelt would say, “bully for you!” If the federal government fails to uphold its basic duty to secure and protect its citizens, then somebody has to do something. That somebody is the individual states that see the threat and realize they will ultimately be affected by what is coming across our Southern border illegally.
The recent so-called visit to the border by Vice President Harris was a joke of a photo opportunity, a “parachute” stop that was nowhere near the trouble spots where our border agents are experiencing unprecedented challenges. She can now say she went to the border, finally, but nothing will change and failed policies will continue to be followed and illegals will continue coming here at the invitation of this administration.
Our governor is known and respected all across South Dakota and the nation for making good decisions on behalf of South Dakota citizens. Now she has stepped up to the plate and made the bold decision to do our small part in attempting to stem the tide of illegal immigration that will ultimately be detrimental to us all.
The initial deployment of the state’s citizen soldiers is expected to last for between 30 and 60 days, according to the governor. S.D. Adjutant Gen. Jeff Marlette and the S.D. Department of the Military are working with their counterparts in Texas to finalize details of this noble mission.
We wish our Guard members well in this deployment and commend our governor for taking this bold action.