RCJ blasts Daugaard, Jackley on Bendagate affair

As former US Attorney for the District of South Dakota Brendan Johnson moves into private practice the US Department of Justice has refused to trust the state's attorney general with sensitive information in the EB-5 scandal.

It should come as no surprise when the Gov. Daugaard Administration decides not to release information concerning an EB-5 visa program that continues to be shrouded in mystery. In March, the Journal's legislative correspondent, Bob Mercer, asked the state Supreme Court to release Attorney General Marty Jackley's death report on Richard Benda, a former state department head and SDRC official who reportedly shot himself in the stomach with a shotgun while dressed in hunting gear near Lake Andes. Since Benda died in October 2013, state officials have seemingly went the extra yard to keep this program under wraps. This lack of transparency reaffirms the fact that closure in this case is not on any agenda in Pierre, which raises even more questions.

Read it here.

The Department of Justice is refusing to release records related to former cabinet secretary Richard Benda, who was at the heart of a state and federal investigation into the state's EB-5 program. The department declined the Argus Leader's request for Benda's FBI file, indicating the matter remains under investigation. The department's response to a Freedom of Information Act request said that releasing the records "could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings." Also included in the investigation was the Department of Justice's Public Integrity unit, which investigates allegations of corruption among elected and appointed government officials.​ The attorney general's office is defending itself from a lawsuit brought by journalist Bob Mercer, who is trying to force the office to release more information about the Benda investigation. The hearing is later this month. [Jonathan Ellis]

Oooops.

Hey, nutball winger, Michelle Malkin is coming to South Dakota State University invited by campus Republicans but SDGOP is scared spitless of what she's going to say.

Can we stop putting America up for sale to the most politically connected bidders yet? Where is our self-respect? Created under an obscure section of the expansionist 1990 Immigration Act, EB-5 promised bountiful economic development for the U.S. in exchange for granting permanent residency (and eventual American citizenship) to foreign investors. A few years later, Congress conjured up the idea of EB-5 “regional centers” — government-sanctioned business groups and corporate entities acting as middlemen to administer the immigrant investments and facilitate the visa peddling. One underling called it “a whole new phase of yuck.” [Michelle Malkin]

The SDGOP's culture of corruption, controlled by principals in banking and health care industries, is unravelling: with federal diligence Pierre could be soon be liberated.