Tatewin Means most logical SDDP pick for SDAG

Arabic, Mandarin and Spanish in South Dakota schools? Sure, that's cool; but learning where students are steeped in American Indian languages is giving the next generation of Natives opportunities to preserve their heritage.

On July 8 and 9 the South Dakota Democratic Party will hold its 2022 State Convention in Fort Pierre where delegates will review and adopt the SDDP platform and resolutions. Delegates will vote to nominate candidates for Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Secretary of State, State Auditor, State Treasurer, School & Public Lands Commissioner, and Public Utilities Commissioner. 

Tatewin Means is a citizen of the Sisseton Wahpeton Dakota, Oglala Lakota, and Inhanktonwan Nations. She is the daughter of the late Lakota activist, Russell Means, is the former attorney general of the Oglala Sioux Tribe and is currently Executive Director of Thunder Valley Community Development Corporation. Means graduated from Stanford University with a degree in environmental engineering, has a law degree from the University of Minnesota and has a masters of Arts in Lakota Leadership and Management from Oglala Lakota College.

Thunder Valley CDC started on the Pine Ridge Reservation as a way to connect youth with the Lakota way of life. It continues its efforts to enhance the Oglala Lakota Oyate by offering a variety of initiatives such as food sovereignty, Lakota language education, housing and home ownership, a regenerative community development and more. “Reclaiming our identity as Lakota people, that's a part of liberation, right? That's a part of freedom,” said Means. “And so eliminating those messages of colonialism that have bound us for so many generations, and so how do you do that? How do you begin that process of decolonizing?” [Bill Janklow's idea of public radio]

I attended a few classes at South Dakota State University in the mid-1970s with Peggy Phelps, Tatewin Means' mother. In 2018 Means challenged Randy Seiler for the Democratic nomination for attorney general and it is the view of this interested party she is the most logical choice to be the 2022 attorney general nominee for the South Dakota Democratic Party.