South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem proudly displayed the new flamethrower her staff gave her for Christmas as she demonstrated its effectiveness by setting a stack of boxes on fire while feasting on her new Christmas toy.
Noem was dressed for the elements in an Army fatigues ensemble – pants with a matching jacket – and hat as she stood outside on her property on a snowy Christmas day and said “Perfect” as the pile burned boxes to a crisp.
In one of the video clips, she poses alongside her husband, Byron Noem, while holding the wearable device.
The 51-year-old married mother of three is the 33rd governor of South Dakota. She is the state’s first female governor since taking office in January 2019 and is considered a rising star and potential future presidential nominee.
The Republican official was endorsed by then-President Donald Trump when she ran for office in 2018
Noem wore an Army fatigues ensemble – pants with a matching jacket – with a hat as she stood outside on her property on Christmas Day, enjoying her new Christmas toy
She demonstrates her effectiveness by setting a stack of boxes on fire and enthusiastically saying, “Perfect.”
Noem grew up with her siblings in Watertown, South Dakota on the family ranch and farm in Hamlin County, a population of approximately 6,614 as of the 2020 census.
In 1994 her father died in an accident with an agricultural machine. Devastated Noem told The Washington Examiner that she found a tape recorder in his truck that gave her the answers she needed and took over running the family business at the age of 22.
A few months after her father’s death, she plucked up the courage to declutter his pickup truck.
“If you have a farmer or rancher in your life, you know that they often make a living off their pickup trucks. Anything important can be found in the taxi,” Noem said in a March 2021 tweet while discussing the tragedy.
The discovery of the first volume led to nearly a dozen.
“My eyes started to fill with tears,” she wrote. “One by one I put them on the tape recorder and listened to Dad talk about crop decisions, soil types, cows, weather, markets and what to do if we were ever in a tough financial situation.”
Noem, who described her father as “the hardest worker I knew,” said hearing his voice on the tapes “changed everything” and was the reason she ran for office.
“He led by example, by action,” she wrote in part. “I made the decision that day to be like my father: a person of words and of action, because both are important.”
“I am committed to always serving the people of this great country in word and deed. I will do what I say and I will always tell you what I do.’
Eventually she added a hunting lodge and restaurant to the family estate and her siblings moved back to help expand the business.
A 1990 graduate of Hamlin High School, she was proclaimed the Snow Queen of South Dakota. She attended Northern State University from 1990 to 1994, but left college to help run the family farm after her father’s death.
She took courses at Mount Marty College’s Watertown campus and at South Dakota State University. She also took online courses at the University of South Dakota.
In 2006, Noem won a Republican seat in the South Dakota House of Representatives, representing the 6th Circuit, and in 2008 she was re-elected.
She served for four years from 2007 to 2010 and was deputy majority leader during her second term.
During her tenure, Noem was the primary sponsor of 11 bills, including several property tax reforms and two bills increasing gun rights in South Dakota.
In 2009 she was Vice-Chair of the Advisory Working Group on Agricultural Land Valuation. Senator Larry Rhoden led the task force and later served as its lieutenant governor.
In 2012, she graduated with a degree in Political Science from SDSU while serving in Congress.
Governor Kristi Noem with her husband Byron Noem and their new flamethrower
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem delivers her fiscal year 2024 budget speech on Tuesday, December 6, 2022 in the chambers of the House of Representatives at the State Capitol in Pierre, SD
Kristi Noem tweeted on June 29, 2022, “In South Dakota we never shy away from a challenge and refuse to let fear take our freedom. So saddle up, because freedom runs FREE here.” The tweet received more than 68,000 views
In June, Noem released the book Not My First Rodeo: Lessons Learned From the Heartland.
In the book, she writes about her childhood on a farm in rural America, her days in Congress and her leadership during a global pandemic, and the influence her father had on her. She wrote a comment her father would often say to her: “We don’t complain about things Kristi. We fix them.”
Flamethrowers come in all shapes and sizes with prices starting at $50 and well into the thousands.