Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Our spring member drive has ended, but it's not too late to give. You have the power to help fund the essential journalism that keeps us all informed. Help us close the gap on our spring fundraising goal! GIVE NOW

Gov. Herbert Urges Caution On Election Amendment

upr.org
Gov. Gary Herbert spoke of the need to preserve last year's deal with Count My Vote supporters.

Part of Republican Gov. Gary Herbert’s Tuesday press conference was dedicated to proposed legislation concerning political party nominations. Sen. Scott Jenkins, a Plain City Republican, put forward a constitutional amendment that would allow parties to choose their own method for primaries.

Herbert said that he would not be opposed to putting the proposal up for a referendum.

“If the people want to vote and say, ‘this is how we want to have our elections,’ and have that kind of choice, I don’t have any problem with putting it to a vote of the people,” he said.

The bill, however, could break a 2014 deal between supporters of the caucus system and Count My Vote, which wanted open primaries. The deal, SB54, made a hybrid system for nominations in Utah by preserving caucuses while allowing for an optional route with petition signatures. After the passage of SB54, Count My Vote agreed to withdraw their own initiative from the ballot.

Herbert said that lawmakers must be cautious about threatening that deal.

“For good and rational reasons, the legislature last year, with Senate Bill 54, said, ‘we’re going to lose the caucus/convention system,’ the belief was, ‘unless we end up striking some kind of compromise,’” he said. “So, in good faith, they said to the Count My Vote folks, ‘look, if you’ll pull off, we’ll compromise and get a hybrid here where we protect the caucus/convention system rather than lose it.’ I think that they need to be careful about looking like we’ve dealt in bad faith.”

The agreement with Count My Vote was key to preserving a caucus system, Herbert said, that has benefited candidates like him who had little money or name recognition when they ran for office.

“I’ve been a strong supporter of the caucus/convention system; I’ve said to anybody who cares to listen, it’s allowed an average guy like me to compete against people with better name identification and more money,” he said. “For me the system has been a good vehicle.”

Jenkins’ bill passed a preliminary vote in the Senate on Monday.