South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem has said what she thinks should be the characteristics of a vice presidential candidate for former President Donald Trump this fall.
And those characteristics sound very much like her.
Noem — included by the GOP front-runner on his short list of potential running mates on Tuesday — told Lawrence Jones of Fox News in an interview published Friday that a needed characteristic of a Trump vice president is “somebody that actually is not part of the swamp.”
The person also should be a business owner, she said, and “somebody who’s been a commander-in-chief, somebody who makes decisions when things get tough.”
Also, Trump “needs to know he can have somebody around him that trusts him and he trusts and will fight,” Noem said.
Noem’s name came up when Fox News host Laura Ingraham queried the former president on possible running mates.
Also on the list were three former contenders with Trump for the Republican presidential nomination: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy.
In addition, Ingraham named Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida and Democrat-turned-independent Tulsi Gabbard, formerly a congresswoman from Hawaii.
Trump responded that all the names she put forth were on his short list.
“Honestly, all those people are good,” he said. “They’re all good; they’re all solid.”
In the 52-year-old Noem’s reference to characteristics Trump needs in a vice president, she fills the bill as having been a businesswoman.
Dropping out of college at 22 to run the family farm after the death of her father, she later put a hunting lodge on the property, a facility Noem continued to manage after being elected to the South Dakota Legislature in 2006.
In 2010, she was elected as the state’s sole representative to Congress.
When elected as South Dakota’s governor in 2018, Noem checked another of her self-imposed vice presidential boxes by becoming commander in chief of the South Dakota National Guard.
Along those lines, she announced Tuesday that, as in 2021, her state’s National Guard would be deployed to the nation’s southern border, and she used language familiar to Trump and his supporters.
“The border is a warzone, so we’re sending soldiers,” Noem said in a news release. “These soldiers’ primary mission will be construction of a wall to stem the flow of illegal immigrants, drug cartels, and human trafficking into the United States of America.”
Noem’s bona fides as a non-swamper came to national attention during the COVID-19 fiasco of 2020.
Would Kristi Noem be a good pick for Trump’s vice president?
Where other government entities zigged, South Dakota zagged, refusing to lock down, downplaying masks and social distancing, and promoting the use of hydroxychloroquine.
In September, Noem endorsed Trump and said if asked to join him on the ticket, she would do so “in a heartbeat.”
So the governor has offered specific qualifications for a vice president for Trump, listed how she fits those qualifications and voiced her enthusiasm for the job.
While the vice presidential office can be a political backwater, it’s commonly recognized as a launching point for the presidency.
Perhaps Kristi Noem is scoping out her own future.
