Senator Tamara R. Grove is a Republican representing District 26 in the South Dakota State Senate, covering Brule, Buffalo, Hughes, Hyde, Jones, Lyman, Mellette, and Todd counties. She serves as a consultant, small business owner, international research author, speaker, and co-pastor at The Hope Center of Lower Brule on the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe Reservation, where she lives with her husband, Pastor Ian Grove, and their pets. Her adult children are Elizabeth, Harvey, and Elijah.

Notable achievements include co-authoring research for the Trump Administration’s First Step Act on criminal justice reform, authoring 10 of 12 community revitalization research papers commissioned by President Trump in 2017-2018, and co-founding the Community Revitalization Collective in Sioux Falls in 2021-2022 to address homelessness, urban rehabilitation, and addiction. She also served as a lobbyist for SD Family Policy Council and Protecting SD Kids from 2020-2023, and addressed homelessness solutions at Secretary Ben Carson’s housing initiative in 2019.

Education and Political Experience

Specific details on formal education are not detailed in available records. Her professional experience includes starting an American Family Insurance agency in 2001, teaching at a local university from 2009, and founding Transformation Consulting in 2011. Politically, she is a new member of the South Dakota Senate , with prior roles in the 2016 Donald Trump Diversity Coalition and as 2018 President Donald Trump Community Revitalization Research Lead. She currently leads Community Revitalization Through The Grove Projects and serves as Reverend at The Hope Center.