Bills / H.B. 25 / Transcript

H.B. 25 Candidate Petition Amendments: transcript

Everything said about this bill in committee and on the floor, speaker by speaker. Each time links to that moment in the official video. Back to the bill: summary and every vote →

Transcribed from the Legislature's recordings by software, with speakers identified from the video; it can contain errors. Check the recording before quoting anyone.

House Government Operations Committee, Jan 26, 2026

Committee chair56:29
house Bill 25. And uh, I will point out that we have a Second Amendment on the public uh, website. So my assumption is you'll be speaking to that, correct? Yes. Alright, go ahead. The time's yours representative.
Rep. Lisa Shepherd56:44
Thank you. Thank you so much for putting this on the agenda. I have worked hard to do some negotiations over the weekend and that's why we have a second substitute. The first one was just technical from items that were adopted in the December special session and this bill was drafted prior to that. So I'd like to draw your attention to what's on the screen right now. And I'm speaking again to the second substitute. So how I presented this originally was my signature, my clerk. Now I'm gonna add the words most likely. So originally we wanted to have this bill have all signature verifications for statewide, well basically all signature verifications goes to the county clerks. So in some negotiating we determined that it would be good to have it with a majority of the signatures in the booklet, it goes to that county clerk. So whichever one that's consistent with the code as what's listed here on this handout that you have here, I'm sorry, the screen that's consistent with what we already have in code there for candidates. And so that's what would happen with this one. The consistency I think is really important. So what I think the issue is, the issue is we have over 300,000 signatures in 24 that were verified by one county and there were 32 candidates. And out of all the signatures that were gathered in the state, 86% of the signatures were verified by one county. I do want to add also that this bill or any of the bills that I'm gonna carry on elections is not a referendum on any person doing the job currently. So I just wanna make sure it's not about people, it's not about personalities, it's not party, not politics, it's just structure. So we have 28 counters whose counties whose voters can't vote for. The one county clerk that is doing all the signature verification, the 86% of all signatures and the verification rates are consistent across the state. And I have those papers if we need to have them. I have all the printouts for that I can pass out. So I think decentralizing the signature verification process for, basically it's everybody, but for, in this particular case for all candidates that are countywide, I'm sorry, statewide, multi-county. And that would include the federal candidates as well as well, I think it provides more transparency. I think it also addresses what we had at 1.6 in the audit that was done by the legislative auditors that wanted us to have more transparency in the elections. I think if there were an opportunity for a conflict of interest and that a clerk perhaps might have a preference for a candidate. Now this is hypothetical, I'm not saying this has happened, but I think by, by taking it and dispersing it to all the counties, I think we would eliminate that possibility of having anyone that perhaps maybe they like Mickey Mouse better. So they would approve Mickey Mouse's signatures first because I just wanna make sure everyone knows that if you sign for two candidates, the one that gets in and gets counted first is the candidate that gets your signature. So if someone liked Mickey Mouse better than Donald Duck, then maybe a clerk might put Mickey Mouses books up there, uh, ahead of the others. So I just wanna make sure that it's a lot less likely to happen if you just take it to all the county clerks and all other petitions are verified by the local clerks. I think this provides a separation of powers and decentralizing the 300,000 signatures from one clerk to each county clerk. It spreads the burden across the state. And I'm gonna tell you this bill came to me because I talked to a federal candidate who they dropped their books, their petition books off to the county clerk that did all of them. And they said that office was overwhelmed. So I'm not understanding why we don't just get it to all the counties and then they can actually take care of those issues. It also makes it easier for local candidates. So if you have people who are collecting in Iron County, it would be easier for them to be able to submit their packets to Iron County instead of having to get to one county in the state, which currently is up in Davis County. I think those are some of the highlights of this. And I, one more thing I wanted to mention is that the counties are already doing signature verification. They already have the employees that they need to do. When I looked at some numbers, I called one of the counties and I said, currently right now I can say that one of the candidates for governor, they had five, just five signature verifications for that county. And it was a smaller county. I said, do you think if we had, let's even say 10 candidates that submitted five, could you handle that? I was told yes. And I think that's really what it is. It's that people will be, the clerks will be able to handle what comes their way. And I think that's everything unless you have questions for me.
Committee chair1:01:36
Alright. I will point out to the committee that the slides you're seeing are on the committee website if you wanna refer to those. Um, so essentially what you're saying in uh, amendment or sub, the second sub is that, uh, once those signatures are collected, you, the change you've made is they'll go to the county in which the majority of the signatures were collected. That's that change. And then you've removed, uh, the item that provided that the county clerk may only certify the signatures of registered voter described above if the registered voter's a resident of that county, you've removed that? That's correct. So that's the primary difference. Yes. And also the notification on the petition booklet wouldn't need to be that you must be a member of the county in order to sign it. The one that's on the top, whoever writes whatever they write, it says this for Utah County. 'cause that's my county. If they wrote Utah County, it was going to have a notification. It says you must reside in Utah County to sign this booklet that's being removed in the second sub. Okay. We have some questions for you, so we'll move to the committee for clarifying. Uh, first of all, Representative Hayes, go ahead.
Rep. Sahara Hayes1:02:44
Thank you. I've got a couple questions if that's okay, Mr. Chair. That's fine. Thank you. Thank you for being here today. Um, I wanna make sure I'm fully understanding this 'cause I felt like solid on your original and this changes things a lot. So when you're talking about how it has to be the majority of signature, is that, like, do the majority of them have to be collect? So lets say I am in Utah County and I'm collecting signatures. Does that mean that the majority of the signatures have to have been collected in Utah County or that the majority of signers have to live in Utah County?
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:03:17
The majority of the signatures, whichever county that they are from, that would go to that Clerk. So the majority of the signers, yes.
Rep. Sahara Hayes1:03:25
So even if I'm in Salt Lake County and the majority of the people who sign are from Utah County. Okay. And I, I apologize, I'm not sure. Is county of residence listed when you sign something? Yes. Okay, great. That clarifies that. Thank you.
Rep. Sahara Hayes1:03:38
Um, and then I'm curious, I I don't think there's a fiscal note on this one. My understanding was that, um, in the original there was some sort of fund, uh, fee associated for, uh, a clerk if it was the wrong signature. Is that or something going on with That? I didn't See that in there. I don't know, But that's gone now. Okay. So it shouldn't be a cost at all. Has that fiscal note made it online yet?
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:04:01
The new fiscal note.
Rep. Sahara Hayes1:04:09
Okay. I was told that there wouldn't be a fiscal note on it. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you Mr. Chair.
Committee chair1:04:17
Do not know how to ask. Okay. Thank you. Sorry about that little hiccup. Appreciate your questions. Uh, Representative Hayes next up is Representative Cutler. Go ahead sir.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:04:29
Thank you. Uh, Mr. Chair, I wanna commend the sponsor for her good work. She's been, uh, working very hard to, uh, work with others and try to find, uh, solutions to this. I have a couple of questions. Uh, three or four if we could have a, a little tag. Could, could you or could we ask someone to explain the difference in the way signatures are verified for a nomination petition compared to an initiative compared to a referenda? Do you feel comfortable?
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:05:01
Do you mean the process? Yes, the process and,
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:05:04
and the process and where they're verified. So I've actually watched each of the processes happen. I've been, well, I've never done signatures for a candidate, but the other ones I have and I've sat and watched 'em actually be verified in, in two counties. And, but I don't know that I could speak to the exact that they're exactly the same on that.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:05:25
Is there a county clerk that could that's in here? I Juab just, I was more interested in, in making sure we all understand that nomination. My understanding is nomination petitions are, uh, verified centrally, whereas referenda and initiative petitions may be, uh, verified locally. Is that
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:05:46
Correct? Well, they're also candidates that only have to get within the one county. And so those are also done locally. So currently the other ones that are the multi-county ones, those are currently done centrally and I'm attempting to decentralize those to where they're already doing 'em in the other counties. And currently initiative initiatives and referenda are those centralized if it's a statewide initiative and statewide referenda, are those centralized or decentralized? Those are currently decentralized. Each county clerk verifies those.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:06:18
Thank you. Thank you. So next question, if we have a rule that says you can only sign one candidate's, um, nomination petition if theoretically, uh, you have one petition going to one packet going to the Carbon County clerk and one going to, uh, the Nebo County clerk and they both see those signatures. One may have happened before them, one may have happened after. How do, how do we decide which one gets counted? Which other ones verified first in Vista?
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:06:55
So it, it's not, and and when the county clerks, maybe we can have one of the county clerks speak to it or you could.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:07:01
So when they verify the signature, is it automatically up upload it and, and in the state Vista system immediately? Or is could there be a delay where one could be verified first but another one uploaded
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:07:15
First? From my experience watching, and of course one of the county clerks can correct me if I'm wrong, that it does happen right away. And so they will go and they will just hit next when it's verified. I think it's next and it'll just go to the next person that they need to verify in that book. But that's what makes it verified.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:07:33
So then there wouldn't be a conflict between different counties and if, if the for other things that we're working on together pass, then the whoever's verified first would get a text or an email notifying them, et cetera. The, uh, last question or, or two, two more questions. Does this, you, you've changed the periods for when uh, these nomination petitions can be, uh, certified? I, I believe does that shorten, there was one that was went from one day before the convention to seven days before the convention.
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:08:06
Does that shorten the time period? What We uh, nope. This is only, this doesn't have anything to do with that timeframe unless I'm missing something that I didn't see. I think that might be in a different bill. Lemme see if I can find records. This, They still have, they have 14 days to verify the signatures.
Unknown speaker1:08:27speaker not certain
What's that? I Can speak to.
Committee chair1:08:29
Alright, we're gonna let the uh, LFA speak for a moment. Hang on. There you go. Yeah, you're not the elephant. It's okay. Um, okay.
Legislative Fiscal Analyst staff (unnamed)1:08:42
KI RGC. So just to speak in this bill, um, in this substitute second substitute also includes moving the, um, deadline for candidates to submit signatures from 14 to 21 days before the convention. Thank you. Increase.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:09:00speaker not certain
So, so it gives more time. So, Or less time. It gives them less time they have To submit. Is it less time to collect signatures so They can have more time before convention?
Unknown speaker1:09:09speaker not certain
Which Line that wasn't requested in my bill. Which one? I'm looking on line 7 7 17 7 19. Is that where you're of the second substitute? Yep. Where we pulled up. Let's go there. Yes. Yes.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:09:32
So the accounting clerk found no later than the earlier 14 calendar days after the day on which the county clerk receives the signatures or seven calendar days before the day on which the qualified political party holds a convention. So to me that says we suddenly be before you basically had up to the convention to get your signatures verified and now you have to have them verified a week before. Does that change, does that mean less time for collecting signatures or just less time for verifying signatures?
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:10:04
That actually I wasn't sure that was in the bill 'cause I didn't request it or be a change unless there was a timeline issue that we had, which we shouldn't have had. Um, this one just mirrors, yeah, this is the same changes in HB 27 as well. So it's the same one. So it shortens the time to submit because you'll have to submit earlier before convention, But doesn't change the window for gathering or signatures Just, just shortening that period.
Committee chair1:10:37
I can also call on the drafting attorney and he can give us an even better explanation. So let me grab Michael really fast too to clarify that.
Rep. Paul A. Cutler1:10:46speaker not certain
And, and this can be handled later, but it was a little, little confusing and mm-hmm. I I don't, it doesn't sound like it was a sponsor's intent to shorten the period for gathering signatures.
Committee chair1:10:57
Yeah. And there are some not in this bill because of that we have some, some concerns, uh, with, with the bill as it stands at this point. So I'm gonna let Representative Welton make a, a comment or ask a question and then we will, we'll move to the next individual. Go ahead representative.
Rep. Doug Welton1:11:14
Okay. Thank you Mr. Chair. I had, uh, a couple questions. One was already asked and I'm just gonna, uh, extend that. So I was curious how packet signature verification over order. It sounds like there's a vista process. The other question I had is like the intake of packets, like which one is number one and number two is that clearly defined and there's a standard procedure? Do you know?
Unknown speaker1:11:39speaker not certain
I know that when I'm at one county and they're receiving the packets, it's timestamped and they fill out some numbers and they put it on the log.
Rep. Doug Welton1:11:45
Okay, perfect. And then the other question I had, uh, dealt with verification rates, you said that you had some information on that I'd like to see that. 'cause there, I've seen some reports that verification rates have varied drastically from one clerk's office to the other's clerk's office. And I don't know if that's true or not. So if you've got that data, I, I'd love to see that before I vote.
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:12:07speaker not certain
And uh, I do have that, I have a paper on that one.
Rep. Doug Welton1:12:10
I also think there might be some people here on that one wanna speak To that issue. Yeah, I assume I see several county clerks here that might be able to answer that. I assume they're gonna come up and speak. So, um, thank you.
Committee chair1:12:20
Alright, thank you. Uh, representative Wilton, I'm gonna recognize Representative Luke Bay.
Rep. Anthony E. Loubet1:12:27
Oh, Mr. Chair. Uh, is it okay if I wait till after public comment?
Committee chair1:12:31
You may. Okay. Thank you. Alright. Um, at this point, uh, are you done with your presentation representative? Yes. Thank you. Alright. Uh, we may, let's see, we'll, we'll see who's out in the audience that wants to speak to this bill. Raise your hand if you wanna speak to this bill. Yeah, so I'm gonna ask you to vacate and, uh, the chair and let open up both these chairs. Raise your hand if you're for the bill. Okay. We've got three and if you're against, raise your hand. Okay. It's pretty balanced. Uh, so, um, there, I believe there's some online as well. Yeah, We'll check. Thank you. Alright, so if you're for the bill, come up to the chair on your right, my left. And if you're against the bill, come up to the chair on your left by. Right. Does that make sense? So go ahead, Marilyn. You're in the right chair. Mark. Yes, ma'am. And Ricky, you're, you're in the right chair. So we started off right. Please sign in, um, tell us who you represent and go ahead. Okay. I'll Go ahead and start. We're gonna give you two minutes each.
Marilyn Momeny, resident1:13:31
Okay. I won't need that, but thank you. This is Marilyn Ney. I'm a citizen representing myself. I live in American Fort and I speak in favor of this bill. I think we've seen in the past some pretty significant issues when we centralized everything and just the more we allow the, um, various county clerks to do their job that allows more transparency. I love the change that is moving to the majority of the signatures rather than counting invalid one or two signatures from out of the county. I think whoever came up with that is a great compromise. But I speak in favor of the bill and hope that we can solve the issue that, that, uh, Representative Cutler bought brought up. I think they're trying to shorten the amount of time to approve the signatures from what I can read. But, um, once that gets solved, I think this is a great bill. Thank you. Thank
Committee chair1:14:30
You, Marilyn. Yeah. Alright, go ahead. Go ahead. Uh, Ricky, we all know you, but go to the formality of telling us who you're and who you Represent. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Ricky Hatch, Chair, Clerks Legislative Committee1:14:39
Ricky Hatch. I'm the Weber County Clerk auditor and, uh, chair of the Clerk's legislative committee. So I'm representing the clerks. Um, the clerks have not taken a position on the second substitute. We haven't met since that has come out. So our position of oppose is on the original, uh, bill. And, uh, there are a few reasons why. First off, it, it's an unfunded mandate that places the cost of signature verification for these, uh, races on the counties, takes it from the state and puts it on the counties. I have spoken with the, the sponsor and she's, uh, from my understanding, she's looking to address that, uh, which we would appreciate. Um, counties would not know whether the threshold for multi-county or statewide candidates has been met, which could result in government inefficiencies. We would be verif, we could be verifying numbers or signatures for candidates who have already met the threshold. But since we would be doing it in our old county, we would have no idea, uh, if the threshold had been met. Um, every county office, uh, is overwhelmed and underfunded. Um, and so the comment that the, uh, the, the one that the state has contracted with is overwhelmed. Uh, we all are. And, uh, so I'm not sure how applicable that is. And the concept that I was a little concerned hearing the concept that, uh, a clerk would alter the behavior of how they, or when they would verify signatures because of a personal preference, that that is concerning to me. The clerks are, uh, a a tight group that really cares about doing things the right way and not putting any political or, uh, personal preference, uh, into this. Um, regarding transparency, this bill, I, I don't, we don't feel that this bill increases the level of transparency and in many ways, it very well could, if a candidate currently wants to observe the signature verification or take a look at those packets, they can do that. They can go to the county that's contracted with Lieutenant Governor's office right now and look at those packets. If this bill were passed, they would have to go to multiple counties, uh, up to 29 different counties to take a look at the packets. Um, and I'm not sure that that is necessarily a, a more transparent process for the candidates or the campaigns. Um, and also if, if there's a concern about the, the personal bent of a single, um, county clerk, that concern should apply to all county clerks and therefore you're, you're now making much broader the chance of risk, the chance of a clerk causing or doing something improperly or not in a transparent manner. So for those reasons, the clerks are opposed to this bill. But we're happy to work, continue to work with Representative Shepherd on this. Alright, Thank you.
Committee chair1:17:28
Maryanne Christensen. I'm executive Director of Oh, oh, hang on, Maryanne. I'm sorry. Sit. Please sit back down. Ricky, uh, we have a, a question that popped up o over here from Representative fia. Go ahead, Doug.
Rep. Doug Fiefia1:17:39
Thank you Mr. Chair. Thank you Ricky, for your, your comments. Just a question that came up while you were speaking, and this may be a question for you and maybe for Ryan Kelly. Uh, is there a reason why we contract out to a county clerk versus the LGS office just handling it?
Ricky Hatch, Chair, Clerks Legislative Committee1:17:55
Um, I'll, I'll defer to him. My guess is that, uh, county clerks verify signatures all the time. We have the equipment and the staff that are fully trained and the LGS office is generally a lot smaller. And so it very well could be a bandwidth and infrastructure, uh, reason, but I'll defer to them.
Committee chair1:18:14
Okay. That can, can we have Ryan? Yeah, Yeah, of course. So Ryan, come up here and take the seat that Ricky's vacating. And would you answer that question for the representative? Thank you.
Ryan Cowley, Director of Elections, Lieutenant Governor's Office1:18:32
Thank you, Mr. Chair. My name is Ryan Callway. I'm the director of elections in the Lieutenant Governor's office. Um, Representative Fiefia in an answer to your question, um, we contract with the county clerk because we just don't have the resources or tools to do that in our office. Um, that contract has been in place since SB 54 passed, and signature verification for nomination petitions has been in play and doing that in a clerk's office. They already have a facility set up with cameras, with security, everything's in place there. They already have staff, um, that are qualified to do the signature verification. They have temps that they bring in that have already done the signature, um, training. And so it's, it's more just to facilitate and utilize the resources in the best manner. 'cause for us to try to gear up, get a warehouse, um, facilities, equipment, those types of things would be very costly for us to do that.
Rep. Doug Fiefia1:19:19
Okay. And then if I can just ask one follow up question. Yeah. Uh, based off of Ricky's comments there, is there a mechanism to notify counties when that threshold is met? Because it sounds like there's some confusion and there might be double counting after it's already met. Is there something that the LGS office, it meets it and then you notify them? What's, what's that process? Yeah, we do post those, uh, daily statistics on our website. So clerks could then go and check that. But you've got 29 clerks who may or may not be going to that daily to do that. But those numbers are posted on our website where they could view it. Okay. Thank you
Maryann Christensen, Executive Director, Utah Legislative Watch1:19:58
Mayor Mary Ann Christensen, executive director of Utah Legislative Watch, and I'm here in support of the bill. I, I think it's really important that we decentralize the counting of signatures regardless of what kind of petition that they're on. Because the more eyes, the more hands, the, the more transparency there is and the less potential for potential fraud. Whether there's been fraud or not, no one can determine that. But the state auditor did determine that there was 10,600 signatures that really couldn't be verified in, in their audit. Those kinds of numbers indicate to Utah voters that there might be problems with centralizing this, um, process. And I think it's time for the legislature to be responsible and to be responsive to the, the fears that voters have when it comes to this process. When my packet is counted in my county, it's my county clerk, the person I elected, the person that I spent a lot of time finding out who they were, I elected them because I trust them to do their job. Every county clerk has a job to do and verifying signatures is one of those jobs. And so I don't think that it, we should consider it a burden that county clerks have to verify signatures when they're not used to. Just because we have not included them in the process, I think it's time to include them all in the process. And so I thank you for your positive vote. Thank you very much.
Committee chair1:21:33
Thank you ma'am. Appreciate you being here. Alright ma'am, go ahead. Tell us who you are you represent.
Cambria Cantrell, Elections Coordinator, Lieutenant Governor's Office1:21:38
Uh, my name's Cambria Cantrell and I'm representing the Lieutenant Governor's office. Um, our office is currently neutral on this bill. Um, but I think this bill strikes the important question of will it improve the process or simply alter it. Um, while our office respects the goal of decentralization, we have a few concerns we would like to raise for the committee to consider. One that has been brought up a few times is how you would handle the intake and processing of packets. Um, one point to consider if a packets are being delivered to multiple counties is if county A received the packet on Monday, but they're a smaller county, they have commission meeting, whatever, and they don't process the packet until Wednesday. If county b receives and processes the packet Tuesday, if someone signed for a different candidate who turned it into a, their signature will get counted for B first, even though it was technically given to a county clerk in a different county first. Whereas if it's all going to one county, that can be caught easily because they know the order, the packets came in and the order that they need to be verified in. Another thing is that our office does take fraud very seriously. Um, when it's centralized, it's easier to spot potential fraud because circulators are submitting packets to the same county and it is easy to see questionable packets and circulation when you receive multiple packets from the same person that are all suspicious. Whereas if you receive each county were to just receive one packet from each circulator, they don't necessarily know the fraud. They might just chalk it up to being a bad packet. Also, currently our office oversees the signature verification of candidates because we are the election officer for those races. Davis County has done a great job in verifying signatures and it's easy for our office with the new processes to go to them and audit the packets. Um, that's something that started this year and with this change we would have to then go to many counties to try and help with these audits rather than just being able to go to Davis County. Um, in short we can implement this bill, but we want to know what the benefits are of changing it or if it's really just changing it. So it is possible, but there are some concerns that arise.
Committee chair1:24:10
Alright. Thank you for providing that. And, uh, let's see. Have we got anybody on the line? We have two online. Alright, Aaron, you go ahead. I think you're the last one in the audience. Was there somebody else in the audience? And then we'll go online. Go ahead. Okay.
Aaron Davidson, Utah County Clerk1:24:22
So Aaron Davidson, Utah County Clerk. I wanna address, uh, representative Cutler's question first. Um, yes we are that this bill would cut out a week of signature gathering. Uh, but candidate filing period was moved up by multiple weeks. So in the, in overall, the candidates still have more time to gather signatures. Uh, so the signatures would have to be done turned in 21 days and that would give the county clerks 14 days to approve or, uh, verify those signatures so it wouldn't be pushing it right up to the convention they would have a week before the convention, which is more, uh, kind of gives some buffer room for us to, for that verification process. Uh, secondly, I really appreciated the previous, uh, bill HB 2 42, which emphasized the consistency of how laws ought to be implemented. Currently there are 28 different types of petitions defined in code and only the nomination petition is the one that is certifi that is verified, uh, centrally. All other petition packets go to the county clerks. So this would just make it more consistent of where the packets are certified, um, rather than being centralized just for one class. Uh, so it just makes a, a clarification and makes it more, uh, consistent on how the, on how the legislation is written and who should be certifying each different type of petition. Thank you.
Committee chair1:25:55
Alright. Thank you Erin. Okay, we'll go online for those that we have. Let's see. We've got, so Seth Stewart will be alright. Seth Stewart, you're up. Turn on your camera. Uh, tell us where you are and uh, we'll give you two minutes.
Seth Stewart, resident1:26:15
All right. I'm Seth Stewart from American Fork. I'm representing myself. And, uh, I, I think it's clear that this bill is a mixed bag. Um, there are some clear trade offs. We're trying to get more transparency, more accountability, more uh, efficiency in some ways. And yet, uh, you know, if you centralize more, uh, you you tend to have, you know, arguably more efficiency, maybe more conflict of interest. Um, and I, I repeat the concerns about the transparency being affected by the fragmentation here, but I think one, one question I have, I I, is why are we so desperate to hang on to the signature gathering process as a whole? I think it's really important to understand how that got installed and why. Um, because the, the effect of the signature gathering is to trigger a direct democratic primary, a popular vote primary in instances where it, the, the convention winner isn't above a certain threshold or, or if someone is just able to gather signatures. And it's always been, um, heavily skewed favoring candidates in particular who have deep pockets. It's, it's a very much more expensive route, uh, for nomination than just a direct competitive election, which is what it displaces whenever it's used to nullify or compete with the caucus convention nominating procedure. And I think, I think that's a fundamental error. I I think we've really painted ourselves into a corner and that's why we're finding that there's just no happy medium here. And so I would urge the propriety of just going back and examining what are the underlying, uh, concerns that the groups involved, uh, ha have been raising. And for example, um, count my vote, uh, that was largely responsible for the signature gathering, nominating petition route. They wanted democratic primaries. And if you look at the constitutional methods of election under our original uh, republic, there were different election methods for different offices. Currently they're entangled and this makes the process more complex. It makes it more costly and uh, less transparent frankly. And so I think those concerns are going to remain until we disentangle these different elements. 'cause you have a Republican type of election method of speaking Republican, lowercase R through the caucus convention and then you have a more democratic method.
Committee chair1:28:27
Alright, Seth, your, your time's up and uh, appreciate your comments. Uh, and you weighed in on this, uh, wish we had more time. We've just gotta keep the agenda moving. So thank you'll go next to, uh, Kristen Richie. Turn on your camera Kristen, so we can see you and uh, then tell us where you are. I, There we go. Can you see, see me and hear Me? Yes ma'am. Go ahead.
Kristin Richey, resident1:29:02
I'm Sorry. Very good. I'm in Highland. Um, I'm speaking in support of the bill. Many of us have concerns with election integrity in Utah and in my opinion, trust in our elections will not return until we have photo ID proving citizenship of individuals in person voting, not mail-in ballots, chain of custody issues being addressed, machine counting ended, and the results being available on election night as well as deep audits. So signatures for candidates has introduced additional problems with election integrity. How are they to be verified and by whom? I believe in this case that we've been dealt this hand, that we've been dealt, that decentralization is absolutely crucial in this case and that the signatures must be counted everyone and not as sampling. I believe this bill is a step in the right direction and I urge its support. Thank you.
Committee chair1:30:05
Alright, thank you very much Kristen, for your comments. And final, uh, commenter Kristen, Christopher Forbush and Christopher, you'll be our last uh, public comments. So turn on your camera please, sir, and uh, tell us where you are. Ah, there you are. Okay. Christopher, you got two minutes. Go ahead sir. Did you unmute yourself Christopher? Alright, we've got a frozen screen here. Sorry about that Christopher. We're gonna, uh, since we're closing out public comment, we will end it here, close out public comment and uh, what we're gonna do now is bring this back to this committee for further discussion and or action. So at this point I'm gonna recognize Representative Lou Bay You did turn your light on. Go ahead sir.
Rep. Anthony E. Loubet1:31:41
Alright, thank you Mr. Chair. Um, I would like to move that we move on to the next agenda item and can I speak to it? Yeah, please speak to the motion. Uh, so with this bill, I was working with the bill sponsor over the weekend. Um, and I appreciate the substitute that she prepared. That was one of the big issues that I had with was when you, uh, under the previous version as you signed, if you weren't in the county you resided in, your signature wouldn't be counted. And I appreciate her making those accommodations to be able to make sure that anybody who signs a packet, it still would be counted. Um, but there's still some outstanding issues that her and I are still working on. It sounds like there's some people here on the, the committee that still has a few little, uh, issues that they're still working through. So I think it's a good idea to just move on to the next agenda item and just allow the bill sponsor a little bit more time to work through those.
Committee chair1:32:29
Alright, that motion's in order. The motion is to move on to the next agenda item. Any discussion to that motion? Alright. Um, because, oh, come on up, Representative Shepherd, wherever you are. Yeah, come on up because this is, uh, a, a motion to move on to the next agenda item and not to vote on your bill. I'm gonna give you some time to respond to the motion.
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:32:55
Yes, I'm, I'm good with that. If there's a couple things that we need to, to further discuss, a couple little snags happened at the last minute, about 15 minutes before. And, uh, a chance to go through with a drafting attorney about the deadlines as well and just verify they were supposed to be in there. Um, so I'd be favorable to that if we can put on another agenda.
Committee chair1:33:14
Okay. Very good. Thank you. And to the maker of this motion, I waive. Alright. You want a sum?
Rep. Lisa Shepherd1:33:21
Sure. I do wanna clarify first and just remember that this is not about any person, any person in office. I actually, there are some perceived views that some people may feel that there's conflicts. I already understand that there's really good people. Our county clerks are really good people. I've been in their offices and I've watched them and I have, I have confidence in our county clerks for sure. Um, I did want to also just say that and just so we'll go to another agenda hopefully that, um, the, the costs already are in the counties and so I would just say that as we go forward and have further discussions that they already hire extra people when they need to. They already do like the UEA, they had that referendum and they already had to have those, uh, amounts of people to come in and help them to verify signatures. So I don't see that as a conflict at all, but I really do appreciate the fact that we'll just work through a couple more things and come back if we can.
Committee chair1:34:21
Okay. Thank you for the summation. And, uh, so the, the motion force is to, uh, simply move on to the next agenda item. So we'll do a voice vote. All in favor of moving onto the next agenda item, which is HB one 60. Say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Alright, thank you. Thank you. Thanks representative.