Fraud and conspiracy: Why is Chet Ellsworth making a name for himself at Davison County meetings?

Sep. 13—MITCHELL — A Rapid City man's public testimony has become a regular part of Davison County Commission meetings over recent months, alleging county leaders are part of a wide conspiracy, without any facts to back it up.

Since the start of August, Chet Ellsworth has made regular visits to the Davison County Commission to use public input periods to make multiple allegations. One of his main thrusts is a county coverup regarding lawsuits related to the 2020 election.

"I think the election interference is going on right now with those machines," he told the Mitchell Republic in an interview. "The actions going on right now are to preclude election integrity. That's where I get in."

Unknown are specifics to Ellsworth's motives for traveling across the state to participate regularly in a government meeting he has little to no connection with, aside from being a citizen of South Dakota. It's also a look at what some government officials and boards are regularly witnessing during public commentary periods, listening to unsubstantiated allegations and out-of-the-blue claims.

In an interview, the Mitchell Republic asked Ellsworth multiple times for his justification to attend Davison County Commission meetings to speak about the ranging topics and his election claims. The best answer Ellsworth gave the newspaper was, "I say what my end game is," he said. "I have asked them some pretty pointed questions and that's what I'll continue to do."

Still, commissioners have said Ellsworth is wasting time and creating unnecessary confusion. Davison County Commissioner John Claggett said on Sept. 3 he was tired of Ellsworth's complaints.

"Chet, we've been really patient with you. We've done this four or five times now. You come and go to a lot of the same stuff," Claggett said. "You're telling us what to do. Your attack on the insurance thing, I don't know where you're getting that. That's just nuts. All 66 counties have that."

"I mean, gosh, do you fly back and forth to do this? You're not a resident here," Claggett continued. "How long are we going to do this? Because it's the same thing every time."

Davison County was one of four counties named in a lawsuit brought by South Dakota Canvassing in 2023 seeking cast vote records and audit logs from the 2020 election and from the county's vote-counting machine, suspecting election fraud without merit. Attorneys for the counties have argued that voter data and machine data from elections is not public record and the South Dakota Office of Hearing Examiners and judges have dismissed the case that included Davison County and other similar lawsuits.

Ellsworth alleges the county is liable because of the lawsuits and is a member of the South Dakota Public Assurance Alliance, which is the publicly owned risk-management and loss-control insurance pool that is available to public governments to fund lawsuits.

Ellsworth has targeted the fact that former auditor Susan Kiepke has taken a job with the SDPAA since resigning from her Davison County job.

"It's affecting my county and every county in the state. They have this insurance company covering for them and they don't have the money to cover what's out there," Ellsworth said. "They do not have the money and now they're bringing in the people so they will work for them. You've got some major conflicts of interest."

Ellsworth hasn't presented facts that indicate truth to his arguments, which have been wide-ranging and at times incoherent.

He has been frustrated by inability to get minutes or meeting records from the county's insurance committee because the county has had to defend itself against lawsuits related to the 2020 election. He attempted to get emails from county employees discussing insurance matters from earlier this year, and was rejected on the basis of attorney-client privilege, he said.

Commission Chairman Randy Reider told Ellsworth the county's insurance committee deals with health insurance and benefits for county employees, not dealing with lawsuits. There's no minutes, Reider said, because the committee doesn't take official policy and rule-making action and final decisions must be made by the county commission.

At a meeting on Aug. 27, Ellsworth tried to argue the county commission didn't have the authority to hold a first reading and hearing on combining the auditor and treasurer offices.

"I've never seen any of these things put on the agenda without authority," he told the board.

The county commission's patience with Ellsworth has begun to wear thin, as evidenced by recent comments at meetings. Commissioner Chris Nebelsick asked Ellsworth what his endgame was with the public input each week.

"I'm just a farmer with kids that's coming to represent our county and I trust our legal counsel on all of these issues. Like what are you trying to do, just stress us out? ... It's not like we have some sort of subversion plan," Nebelsick said. "I don't sit at home and think about, 'How can I hose people and do things in secret?' That's not what we're doing here. We're trying to do what's best for our people and for our employees in full view and I wish you would give us a little credit for that."

Compared to some of his other public testimony, Ellsworth's allegations in Davison County are benign. In November 2023, he alleged the Minnehaha County Commission engaged "sharia conduct" and was part of a terrorist cell with the state bar association to cover up "COVID culpability and election interference." He alleged that the commission was responsible for 16 million deaths related to COVID.

Ellsworth said Davison County does not keep good records and there's no recordings of the county's meetings or official business. He posited that because this newspaper publishes the county's legal notices, that any records the newspaper has should be subject to Freedom of Information Act requests. (This reporter informed Ellsworth that recordings gathered during the course of reporting are not public records.)

"I might send you a letter requesting those recordings," Ellsworth said, to which this reporter responded it would be something the Mitchell Republic's lawyers would have to handle.

He also believes that because there's no video of the county's meetings, that allows them to cover up misdeeds. He said the media in Mitchell is responsible for keeping record of what the commission does because the county doesn't keep adequate records of its meetings.

When pressed about which people are committing crimes, Ellsworth had no specifics.