'President Trump did nothing wrong': Gov. Kristi Noem responds to hush money verdict

Minutes after former President Donald Trump was found guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in a New York criminal trial, Gov. Kristi Noem called it a "wrongful conviction" and accused the jury, judge and prosecutor in the case of bias.

"Massively conflicted, Biden donor and Liberal judge + stacked jury with unconstitutional jury instructions + radical leftist prosecutor = wrongful conviction." Noem wrote on X, the website formerly known as Twitter. "President Trump did nothing wrong, and even the liberal media knows it. The judge violated Trump’s constitutional rights and did everything in his power to get this outcome despite the clear evidence Trump was innocent. No doubt Trump will be easily vindicated soon as the case will obviously be overturned on appeal."

Trump was found guilty Thursday afternoon after a weeks-long trial in which prosecutors alleged Trump had falsified business records to hide payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016.

Noem, who has a storied history of supporting Trump and who has received his endorsements, is a possible vice president candidate in Trump's 2024 presidential campaign.

She has also faced recent significant criticism before and after the May 7 release of her book, "No Going Back." The book, released May 7, caught traction after she included a passage that describes her shooting her 14-month-old hunting dog Cricket and a goat 20 years ago, and at least two corrections tied to false anecdotes inside, including a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jung Un that didn't happen and statements that Sen. Mike Rounds called for Trump to drop out of the 2016 presidential race.

Trump responded to Noem's recent controversies two weeks ago on a conservative podcast, stating Noem had a "bad week."

Noem went on to say the verdict was a "rigged conviction," and called Trump a "voice for the masses."

What others said:

Other South Dakota leaders have weighed in as well at the Congressional level.

Sen. John Thune, SD - R, tweeted that he thought the case was "politically motivated from the beginning.""I’ve been on a flight, but just landed and saw the news," he wrote. "...today's verdict does nothing to absolve the partisan nature of this prosecution. Regardless of outcome, more and more Americans are realizing that we cannot survive four more years of Joe Biden. With President Trump in the White House and a Republican majority in the U.S. Senate, we can finally end the disastrous Biden-Schumer agenda that's crushing American families and businesses.

Rep. Dusty Johnson, SD - R, didn't release a statement on social media, but reshared a statement from the attorney general of Virginia on X, who alleged the case only moved forward becauseof "a far-left prosecutor who regularly refuses to prosecute violent criminals but chose to move forward because the defendant was named Donald Trump."

Sen. Mike Rounds, SD - R, told other local media he wasn't surprised by the verdict, but expressed concern about how this situation would continue to divide the country, and whether an appeals process would unfold.

"I think it’s going to be extremely difficult to bring America back together again and to not believe that this wasn’t an attempt to influence the election outcome this year," Rounds told KELO on Thursday evening. "This is going to be hard to bring people back together again."

This article originally appeared on Sioux Falls Argus Leader: Kristi Noem responds to Donald Trump conviction in 'hush money' trial