• SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) -- A lifelong Democrat who lost an election to former Republican U.S. Sen. Larry Pressler nearly a quarter century ago is working to help Pressler get his old job back.
• Ted Muenster, president emeritus of the USD Foundation, has been circulating petitions in Vermillion this week to get Pressler on the 2014 ballot as an independent candidate for the seat being vacated by Sen. Tim Johnson, D-S.D.
• "He makes a lot of sense, in terms of telling both political parties that they need to get off of their ideological high horses and do some compromising for the good of the country," said Muenster. "And I think that message is a valuable contribution to the Senate campaign this year."
• Muenster is among several well-known South Dakota political figures from both parties lending a hand to Pressler, who served two terms in the House followed by three Senate terms from 1975 to 1997.
• Former GOP state lawmaker Gene Abdallah, who hosts an annual law enforcement dinner that draws 1,500 people, said he's backing Pressler partly because he doesn't care for the field of Republican candidates and partly as a show of loyalty to the man who helped him become U.S. Marshal for South Dakota in 1982.
• "I just felt I should return the favor," Abdallah said.
• Don Frankenfeld, a Rapid City economist and lifelong Republican, said Pressler is a candidate with extraordinary credentials and the timing is right for an independent voice. Pressler was first elected to the U.S. House in 1974 during the Watergate scandal when Republicans were losing in droves, Frankenfeld said.
• "He ran against an incumbent and won, and I think that was because he was a new fresh, likable face at a time when we were all kind of desperate for somebody who wasn't a conventional politician," he said. "And I think that time is back again."
• Johnson announced last March that he was retiring from the Senate seat he has held since beating Pressler in the 1996 general election.
• Rick Weiland, an ex-staffer for former Sen. Tom Daschle, is the lone Democratic candidate. Former Gov. Mike Rounds is the most prominent Republican name in a crowded party field that includes Sioux Falls physician Annette Bosworth, Yankton attorney and Army Reserves Major Jason Ravnsborg and state lawmakers Larry

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