{"id":18727,"date":"2026-02-07T17:01:39","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T17:01:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/a-maga-push-to-erase-a-dem-house-seat-is-triggering-accusations-of-fraud-and-violence-in-utah\/"},"modified":"2026-02-07T17:01:39","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T17:01:39","slug":"a-maga-push-to-erase-a-dem-house-seat-is-triggering-accusations-of-fraud-and-violence-in-utah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/a-maga-push-to-erase-a-dem-house-seat-is-triggering-accusations-of-fraud-and-violence-in-utah\/","title":{"rendered":"A MAGA push to erase a Dem House seat is triggering accusations of fraud and violence in Utah"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

National Republicans are throwing money and bodies at a down-ballot initiative to try to wrest back a congressional seat in Utah. Their efforts could blow up in their face.<\/p>\n

With a looming February 15 deadline, Republicans have seen only half the number of verified signatures they need to move things forward. And the effort, which has the backing of President Donald Trump<\/u><\/a> and support from multiple MAGA groups, has devolved into chaos.<\/p>\n

Local county clerks are flagging hundreds of potentially fraudulent submissions. People have reportedly been repeatedly misled<\/u><\/a> into signing the petition by signature-gatherers, with some telling local news outlets that they were told it was an anti-ICE petition<\/u><\/a>. Those signature-gatherers have reported being assaulted<\/u><\/a> by hecklers and their signature packets stolen or destroyed.<\/p>\n

In the Beehive State, where politics are often seen by outsiders as cartoonishly friendly, this effort has turned so tumultuous that Republican Gov. Spencer Cox \u2014 who earned national attention for his pleas for civility<\/u><\/a> after conservative influencer Charlie Kirk was assassinated in the state \u2014 called on Utahns<\/u><\/a> to \u201cresolve [their] disagreements peacefully.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the GOP groups insist they\u2019ll have the numbers needed, they\u2019re still far short \u2014 which would represent a major failure in a ruby-red state.<\/p>\n

The effort aims to overturn a new judge-ordered congressional map<\/u><\/a> that hands Democrats one safe blue seat by attempting to repeal an anti-gerrymandering law that would allow the Republican-controlled legislature to reinstall a more favorable map ahead of the 2028 elections. It has garnered support from Trump and his allies, who had already spent $4.3 million on the effort as of November \u2014 and have only ramped up since.<\/p>\n

The signature-gathering initiative represents an early test of Republicans\u2019 ground-game efforts in a midterm year where they face strong headwinds<\/u><\/a> in the polls.<\/p>\n

Trump and his son, Donald Trump Jr,<\/u><\/a> have signaled support to the Utah initiative, with Trump recently encouraging his Truth Social followers to support the \u201cvery important effort\u201d to \u201dKEEP UTAH RED.\u201d<\/p>\n

Turning Point Action \u2014 the 501(c)(4) founded by the late Charlie Kirk, who was killed in the state last summer \u2014 is \u201call in\u201d on the effort, its COO said,<\/u><\/a> and is canvassing the state with a half-dozen events over the next week<\/u><\/a>. A fleet of about 700 paid workers, many of them from out of state, have been hired to gather signatures, bankrolled by Securing American Greatness Inc., a 501(c)(4) previously run by former Trump White House official Taylor Budowich<\/u><\/a>. And MAGA celebrity Scott Presler<\/u><\/a> parachuted in last month for a series of events.<\/p>\n

But so far, those efforts don\u2019t appear to be paying off. As of Friday, the initiative had garnered just over 76,000 verified signatures<\/u>, about half of the more than 140,000 required statewide for a measure to be added to this November\u2019s ballot. A daily analysis conducted by independent journalist Bryan Schott<\/u> shows the initiative on track to fall well short of the required signature thresholds: eight percent of all active registered voters statewide, and eight percent in at least 26 of the 29 Utah state Senate districts.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only thing that will matter is on the very last day, do we have enough signatures, and I strongly believe that we will,\u201d said Brad Bonham, a Republican National Committeeman and initiative sponsor.<\/p>\n

The initiative\u2019s Republican backers claim the lagging signature count is part of their strategy. Bonham said the initiative\u2019s sponsors have \u201cmany, many thousands of signatures\u201d they are independently verifying and have not yet submitted. Utah Republican Party Chairman Rob Axson said \u201cmany tens of thousands\u201d more have been submitted to county clerks and are undergoing verification.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe feel very, very good about the strategy that we are executing on and the momentum that we’re building,\u201d Axson said.<\/p>\n

Dropping a large tranche of signatures close to the February 15 deadline could backfire, said Elizabeth Rasmussen, the executive director of Better Boundaries, the anti-gerrymandering group opposing the repeal, as signers still have a 45-day window after their signature is verified to remove it.<\/p>\n

Rasmussen said her group mailed nearly 8,000 letters<\/u><\/a> last week to petition signers encouraging them to remove their names, and will continue to do so in coming weeks. Her groups\u2019 previous efforts have led to over 500 signatures removed, Rasmussen said.<\/p>\n

And she\u2019s not so sure that Trump\u2019s involvement will help the GOP in a heavily conservative state whose voters nonetheless have long been skeptical of the president.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump\u2019s approval rating in Utah is at an all-time low,\u201d Rasmussen said. \u201cWe\u2019re not seeing that as a value add, if anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ongoing saga in Utah is an odd addendum to the nationwide redistricting push<\/u><\/a>. In 2018, Utah voters passed Proposition 4, a ballot measure that created an independent redistricting commission to prevent partisan gerrymandering. Earlier this year, District Judge Dianna Gibson ruled that the GOP-controlled state legislature failed to comply<\/u><\/a> with Prop 4 when it drew four safe Republican districts in the 2022 map. The GOP submitted another map with four safe seats last fall, but the judge selected a different map<\/a>, which includes a blue seat in Salt Lake County, in November.<\/p>\n

The GOP-controlled state legislature is appealing Gibson\u2019s decision<\/u><\/a> to the state Supreme Court, and two sitting U.S. House members joined a federal lawsuit<\/u><\/a> pushing for the current, Republican-friendly map to be used in 2026. The state GOP\u2019s signature-gathering push would repeal Prop 4 and allow the legislature to redraw a map ahead of the 2028 cycle.<\/p>\n

If they meet the requisite signature threshold, the initiative will go on the ballot this November, where voters will decide.<\/p>\n

In Utah County, the state\u2019s second-most-populous county, the clerk\u2019s office has flagged hundreds of signatures<\/u><\/a> for possible fraud. Some appear to be forged signatures, and when the clerk\u2019s office called the signers, they denied ever signing the petition; others appear to be made-up names and addresses.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it’s just the signature gatherers that are doing this are just trying to find an easy way to make money,\u201d Aaron Davidson, the Utah County Clerk, told Blue Light News.<\/p>\n

The Salt Lake and Davis county clerks \u2014 the first- and third-most populous counties in the state \u2014 said they have not seen any significant irregularities. \u201cThe number of alleged fraudulent voters that Utah County has found, that is startling,\u201d said Lannie Chapman, the Salt Lake County clerk. \u201cWe all take this very seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Axson, the GOP state chair, said some of the signature-gatherers under review were flagged by his team before submission, and several paid signature-gatherers who are under review for fraud have been fired. “I don’t want a single fraudulent signature counted,\u201d Axson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAre there going to be a couple of bad actors, or bad examples, or places where the process has fallen short, or whatnot? Of course there are,\u201d added Axson. \u201cBut what’s not being talked about in all of these stories is the fact that out of 3,000 people engaged in this effort, you only have a small handful of bad actors.\u201d<\/p>\n

But as the signature push enters its home stretch, tensions have only accelerated.<\/p>\n

\u201cViolence is not the answer to any of this. I don’t understand anybody that would do that,\u201d added Bonham, the initiative sponsor. \u201cIt brings me back to Charlie Kirk losing his life here in our own backyard. It’s like, what on earth is going on here?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

National Republicans are throwing money and bodies at a down-ballot initiative to try to wrest back a congressional seat in Utah. Their efforts could blow up in their face. With a looming February 15 deadline, Republicans have seen only half the number of verified signatures they need to move things forward. And the effort, which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18727\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}