Where I Stand on Immigration and Border Security

When I tell people in Rapid City that immigration and border security belong in my platform, the same question comes back almost every time. The southern border is about a thousand miles from Pennington County. Why is a man running for the South Dakota House talking about it?

Fair question. It deserves a straight answer.

The border is a federal line. The bill for ignoring it comes due locally. It comes due in the paycheck of a working dad in North Rapid who got underbid by an outfit paying cash under the table to people with no lawful right to work here. It comes due in a state budget where every dollar spent on someone not lawfully present is a dollar that never reaches a South Dakota family, a senior on a fixed income, or a kid who needs help. It comes due on I-90 when somebody hauling 80,000 pounds through a January whiteout cannot read the sign telling him the road ahead is closed.

Washington owns the border. Pierre owns what happens inside South Dakota. I am running to take care of our end.

Where I stand

My principle on this issue is one sentence: a nation without borders is not a nation. Applied to the powers a state legislator actually holds, that principle comes down to four commitments.

1. Mandatory E-Verify for South Dakota employers. Every employer confirms that every new hire is lawfully eligible to work here. Same rule for everybody.
2. Full cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. When federal officers enforce the law, South Dakota works with them, not around them.
3. English proficiency for commercial driver's licenses. If you want the license to haul heavy freight on our roads, you can read our signs and talk to our troopers.
4. No public benefits or in-state tuition for those not lawfully present. South Dakota's promises belong to the people lawfully in South Dakota.

Read that list again and notice what is not on it. Nothing touches anyone who is in this country lawfully. Not one line. If you stood in line, filled out the forms, and came the right way, this platform asks nothing of you and takes nothing from you.

The objections, answered straight

I would rather answer the hard questions in writing than dodge them at a forum. Here are the five I expect to hear most, and exactly where I land on each.

"This is a federal issue. You are running for the state House."

The border crossing is federal. Every item on my list is a state lever. Whether South Dakota employers must use E-Verify is state law. Whether our agencies cooperate with federal enforcement is state policy. Whether tax dollars fund benefits and tuition discounts for people not lawfully present is a state budget decision. Commercial driver's licenses are issued by the state. I am not promising to build a wall from Pierre. I am promising to pull the levers Pierre actually holds, all four of them, without apology.

"E-Verify is red tape for small business."

I am a businessman. I have no patience for paperwork that exists to make a bureaucrat feel busy. E-Verify is not that. It is a free federal tool that takes minutes and confirms a new hire is lawfully eligible to work. The employer it actually squeezes is the one gaining an edge by hiring people not lawfully here and paying them off the books. Right now the honest shop in Rapid City eats that disadvantage on every bid. Mandatory E-Verify is not a burden on honest employers. It is their protection.

"We have a workforce shortage. This will hurt the economy."

South Dakota needs workers. Nobody serious disputes that. But a shortage is not a license to look the other way while an under-the-table labor market undercuts the wages of working families in North Rapid. Here is the part that gets skipped in this argument: nothing in my platform touches a worker who is here lawfully. E-Verify clears a lawful worker in minutes. The people who came the right way deserve a labor market that is not rigged against them by the people who did not.

"Requiring English for truck drivers is discrimination."

It is a safety standard, and it protects every family that shares the road, whatever language they speak at home. An 80,000 pound rig on I-90 in a Black Hills winter is not the place to discover that a driver cannot read a closure sign, follow a detour, or understand a trooper at a roadside stop. Any driver from any background can meet the standard. South Dakota should confirm it before handing over the license, not after the crash.

"Cutting benefits and tuition is heartless."

This one deserves the most honest answer I can give. I founded and run a nonprofit. I have sat at kitchen tables with families in real crisis, and I do not talk about hardship as an abstraction. Compassion is real. So is arithmetic. Public benefits and in-state tuition are promises between South Dakota taxpayers and the people lawfully in this state. Every dollar routed around that line is a dollar that never reaches a family that kept the rules. And think about the immigrant who did everything right, paid the fees, and waited the years. Rewarding unlawful presence tells that person the rules were for suckers. So the line stays where the law puts it: lawfully present. Inside that line, nobody loses a thing.

The ask

Here is my whole philosophy on this, and it runs through every pillar of my platform. A family locks its front door at night. Not out of hatred for the neighborhood. Out of love for the people inside, and out of respect for every guest who knocks and is welcomed in the right way. A state is no different. Strong families build a strong South Dakota, and rules that are enforced are promises that get kept.

On November 3, 2026, District 32 picks two representatives. If you want one of them holding this line, go to zac4sd.com: read the full platform, and if it sounds like your kitchen table, donate or volunteer right there.