SD Governor · 2026
Republicans are heavily favored to win this governorship
100% probability
Candidates
Last verified 2026-09-14.
Dan Ahlers
Democrat
Larry Rhoden
Republican
Larry Robert Rhoden is an American politician and businessman serving since 2025 as the 34th governor of South Dakota.
Held by a Republican, seeking re-election.
Not applicable to this race: Candidate fundraising split, Candidate fundraising data available, Candidate fundraising split (state filings), State campaign finance data available · Built on annual structural data, current release 2026-05-29: State mood: Domestic Stability, State mood: Isolation. See /status for current data freshness.
Why we think this
- This state's baseline partisan lean favors Republicans by about 61 points of margin before anything else is considered.
- The seat is currently held by a Republican, who is running for re-election -- incumbents usually run ahead of their party's baseline.
- Separately, current public mood in this state specifically is shifting strongly toward Republicans, on top of the structural baseline.
- Independently, the national midterm environment is shifting every race this cycle modestly toward Democrats -- a separate, nationwide force layered on top of the state-specific factors above, not a restatement of them.
Model details -- coefficients, calibration, and the full technical decomposition.
Model sengov-2026-govmoney-v1 · computed 2026-09-16