The 252 high school boys, both juniors and seniors, who were delegates to the 78th Annual Session of The American Legion Boys State of South Dakota, held their general election for state officers on Thursday, June 3rd. After lunch, election results were announced by Boys State Director, Chris VanDelist.
Joseph Gebel of Mitchell, who will be a senior this year at Mitchell High School, was elected as Governor. Elected as Lt. Governor was Ethan Gladue of Sioux Falls, who is a student at Lincoln High School.
John Costello of Sioux Falls and Blake Stark, also of Sioux Falls were selected as the two delegates to represent South Dakota at The American Legion Boys Nation in Washington, D.C. in July. Quinn Bormann of Parkston and Ethan Gladue of Sioux Falls were selected as Alternate Delegates.
Griffin Gates of Pierre was selected as the 2021 recipient of the Samsung, American Legion Scholarship award. Griffin’s application has been forwarded to the National American Legion Selection Committee. The committee will award ten, $10,000 scholarships to the National Finalists.
Other election results were James “Pierce” Sword of Custer for Attorney General; Joshua Park of Brookings for Secretary of State; Raven Olson of Volga as State Auditor; Nicholas Tooley of Sioux Falls as State Treasurer; John Dekkenga of Sioux Falls as Commissioner of School and Public Lands. Elected as members of the Public Utilities Commission were Junior Berndt of White, Cormac Duffy of Fort Pierre, and Grant Sternhagen of Brookings.
In non-political elections, the delegates also elected seven justices to serve on the Supreme Court. Elected as Supreme Court Justices were Nathan Fairholm of Vermillion, Griffin Gates of Pierre, Payton Lemme of Volga, Max Mickelson of Sioux Falls, Wylie Mursu of Big Stone City, and Ethan Yu of Sioux Falls. Jeremiah Donahoe of Garretson was elected the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
Caleb McGregor of Newell was selected as the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Alexander Johnson of Sioux Falls was elected as the President Pro-Tem. Drake Rogers of Milbank was selected as the Nationalist Party Chairman and Logan Decker of Gettysburg was the Nationalist Party Keynote Speaker. The Federalist Party chose Samyuk Nepal of Brookings as their Party Chairman, and Luke Richardson of Canton as their Keynote Speaker. Joseph Gebel of Mitchell captured the honors of Outstanding Speaker.
Henry Haft of Sioux Falls was selected as the Outstanding Boys State Citizen and Caleb McGregor of Newell received the Spirit of Boys State Award, which recognizes the Boys State Delegate who best exemplifies the purpose of American Legion Boys State of South Dakota. The Outstanding Journalist was Hal Lam of Sioux Falls.
American Legion Boys State of South Dakota was held on the campus of Northern State University in Aberdeen, May 31 – June 4, 2021.