At 92, Rapid Citian and S.D. Hall of Famer Stan Adelstein is still fighting for what he believes in for his state
Stan Adelstein is 92, but the longtime Rapid City businessman, politician and community leader isn’t done making his voice heard and his opinion known.
On Oct. 7, Adelstein signed a petition in Rapid City to place legalizing abortion on the 2024 ballot. As he returned to his car, an anti-abortion activist who harangues people who sign the petition followed him, trying to change his mind even after Adelstein asked to be left alone.
That’s when the anti-abortion guy learned that Adelstein may be old, but he is not that old. There is still plenty of fight in him, as Leah Bothamley, who goes by the sobriquet “Dirtbag Economist,” reported on X, the former Twitter.
“I’m sick of it. I am 92 years old, I’ve lived here all my life but for 11 years,” Adelstein told the annoyingly persistent man who refused to listen to what he was told. “I served, I was in the Army, and I think your sort of thing, telling people what NOT to do, is really, really insulting.”
Bothamley has been collecting signatures to help get the South Dakota Right to Abortion, an initiated constitutional amendment, on the ballot next year. It was filed on Sept. 19, 2022, about two months after the U.S. Supreme Court, with its far-right majority thanks to the three justices named by President Donald Trump, overturning Roe v. Wade, which enacted a trigger law in South Dakota banning the medical procedure unless the mother’s life is in peril.
It was filed by Dakotans for Health, which is led by longtime Democratic staffer and candidate Rick Weiland. It continues to collect signatures to get the question of abortion on the ballot and let the people decide.
We have done that twice before in South Dakota after the Legislature tried to ban abortion. Both times, voters pushed back.
Planned Parenthood placed initiated measures on the ballot. In 2006, it was overturned 185,945-148,648, or 56%-44%. In 2008, voters once again rejected the ban, 206,535-167,560, or 55%-45%.
Adelstein was in the midst of those battles, too. In 2006, I covered a pair of pro-choice rallies in Rapid City. They were, unsurprisingly, very emotional events, with people on both sides making their views known at a loud and passionate level.
At one rally, I turned around to see Adelstein offering his support for some pro-choice women. An angry voice on the other side of the question berated him, but she got the same response that guy received last week.
Adelstein is never shy about making his views known. He’s a Republican, but he has distanced himself from his party in recent years, endorsing Democrats Billie Sutton and Jamie Smith for governor in 2018 and 2022, and donating money to candidates he respects and trusts from both parties.
He is pro-choice and has been proud to make that clear even when other Republicans say he isn’t in lockstep with his party. No, he is not, because he remembers a time when the GOP believed in allowing people to make their own choices. That’s the kind of Republican Stan Adelstein was and still is.
Stanford Adelstein puts his mouth and his money where his mind is. In 2006 and 2008, he was involved in a fascinating political campaign involving three candidates with distinctly different views. Adelstein, then a state senator, was upset in the 2006 Republican primary by Elli Schwiesow, a far-right Republican who surprised most observers by knocking off the influential senator.
Typically, Adelstein didn’t take that without responding. He was offered the Democratic nomination for his seat, but after studying it, turned that down. But he did call a press conference when he endorsed Democratic candidate Tom Katus, donated money to him and campaigned door-to-door with him!
Katus won, and he is the last Democrat to win a legislative seat in the Black Hills. He didn’t get a second term, however, in another bizarre twist.
On the Saturday after the 2006 general election, Adelstein and Katus met with folks at a Rapid City McDonald’s. Stan told me he was glad Katus had won, but he planned to return to the Senate in two years.
He hoped Katus would accept that and run for a state House of Representatives seat. I relayed that to Tom, who stared at me in amazement. He checked with his friend and campaign ally, who was about to be his rival.
Stan confirmed it, and did exactly as he promised. He ran against Katus in 2008 and beat him. He was re-elected in 2010, 2012 and 2014 before he stepped down in 2015 for health reasons.
That didn’t sideline him, however. Stan has remained involved, lending his voice and money — he is a millionaire through his Northwestern Engineering Company and other holdings — to support causes and candidates he believes in.
In 2021, Adelstein celebrated his 90th birthday on Aug. 19 by offering $100 to 90 people if they would take the Covid-19 vaccination, as intrepid Rapid City reporter Arielle Zionts reported.
“My hope is that this vaccination clinic will save lives,” Adelstein said. “In the Jewish faith we believe ‘to save a single life, is to save the world entire.’”
He believes that and makes that clear through his words and actions. That’s the way Stan has been for decades, and even at 92, he’s not stopping.
Long may he make waves.
Tom Lawrence has written for several newspapers and websites in South Dakota and other states and contributed to The New York Times, NPR, The Telegraph, The Daily Beast and other media outlets.
