For Immediate Release: Tuesday, October 7, 2014

KEY TAKEAWAYS on Duffy press conference: 

1) Mr. Mike Rounds has confessed to a felony that bars him from holding public office for life in South Dakota. 
 
Mike Rounds prepared and submitted false testimony to the Government Operations and Audit Committee and later tried amending his response after a Rapid City Journal reporter found evidence to contradict Rounds’ written testimony. These actions violate SDCL 22-12A-16. Violation of this statute is a class 6 felony whose penalty is disqualification from any public office under SDCL 22-12A-10.
 
2) SDDP attorney Patrick Duffy called on the state to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Mike Rounds’ felony confession and Joop Bollen’s illegal actions to take control of the EB5 program while he was still a state employee.
 
With the public nature of the EB5 scandal and the clear conflicts of interest in the Attorney General’s office, the state must appoint a special prosecutor to finally root out the rampant EB5 corruption in the Rounds administration. 
 
3) As a result of Mike Rounds’ confession that he committed a felony, the South Dakota Democratic Party has called on Mike Rounds to withdraw from the race to give South Dakota a choice between clean candidates for US Senate.
 
With the Rounds campaign now participating in the cover up of Mike Rounds’ felony, the best thing Rounds can do for the voters of South Dakota is to withdraw from the race for US Senate. South Dakotans can’t afford to send someone to the US Senate who will have to forfeit his office as a result of the crimes he has committed.
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