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The eldest daughter of disgraced Utah parenting blogger Ruby Franke has taken action to help protect other kids with a new child actor law in her home state.
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Utah Gov. Spencer Cox signed the bill that Shari Franke helped promote, HB322, which gives certain payment and privacy protections to minors involved in entertainment, which could include traditional acting, i.e. acting in TV commercials, or acting in social media content.
“I have been working on drafting HB322 that would protect child influencers in our state,” Shari Franke said in a February Instagram post. “This bill would require parents to create a trust fund for their children and require parents to pay children a minimum amount. It would also allow children influencers, at 18, to have any content they appeared in to be removed from all social media platforms.”
Shari added that certain family bloggers and lobbyists in Utah are against the legislation, but wrote that “[i]f family vlogging is as good as ‘ethical’ family vloggers want you to think, they should not fear being mandated to pay their children (because they say the children are already being paid anyway).”
MOMMY BLOGGER RUBY FRANKE ASKED DAUGHTER FOR ONE THING BEFORE ARREST: MEMOIR
Shari Franke details the last word she said to her mother in her new memoir, “The House of My Mother.”(Handout)
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“And if children are supposedly consenting to being filmed, why fear the kids would want content removed once 18?” she wrote.
Shari’s support of HB322 is one of many actions she has taken to try and help protect the rights of children whose parents are social media influencers since her mother pleaded guilty to multiple counts of child abuse in 2023 and sentenced to years in prison.
MOMMY BLOGGER RUBY FRANKE’S HUSBAND SAYS ‘SOME CRAZY S–T’ WENT ON IN ABUSE ACCOMPLICE’S $5.3M FORTRESS
Blogger Ruby Franke pleaded guilty to child abuse in Utah.(Instagram/ moms_of_truth)
Democratic Utah State Rep. Doug Owens, who sponsored the bill, explained its purpose to Fox News Digital.
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“It’s a bill that has a couple different parts: one is it protects traditional child actors, like in the film industry or making commercials, [it] has their parents set aside 15% of their earnings for when they become an adult, and that is copying a number of other states,” Owens said. “And then it goes further and also includes protections for children in social media content.”
He added that it is “usually” children’s parents featuring kids in their content and, in turn, earning money from that content.
Utah authorities found two malnourished and emaciated children at a home in Utah prior to arresting Franke and Hildebrandt.(Instagram/ moms_of_truth)
“It … requires the parents or other adult to save some of that money for the kids when they get to be an adult,” he said. “And then it also has a third part, which says that if you are a child in content creation, when you get to be an adult and you find that content embarrassing or emotionally damaging in some way, you can have that removed from the website later so that it gives kids some protection for when they get to be an adult.”
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“[I]f you are a child in content creation, when you get to be an adult and you find that content embarrassing or emotionally damaging in some way, you can have that removed.”
— Utah State Rep. Doug Owens
Ruby Franke, a 43-year-old mother of six, and Jodi Hildebrandt, a 55-year-old mother of two, ran a joint parenting and lifestyle YouTube channel called ConneXions Classrooms before they were arrested and pleaded guilty to four of six counts of second-degree aggravated child abuse in a St. George courtroom in December 2023.
Utah police found a “panic room” inside Jodi Hildebrandt’s $5.3 million Ivins home, where Ruby Franke sent her children to stay with Hildebrandt.(Washington County Attorney’s Office)
Utah authorities initially arrested Ruby Franke and Hildebrandt for abusing Franke’s two youngest children, a 9-year-old girl and 12-year-old boy, after Franke’s son approached a neighbor for help in 2022, and the neighbor called 911. Some of the abuse occurred in Hildebrandt’s home in Ivins, Utah.
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911 CALL REVEALS SHOCK OF UTAH MOMMY BLOGGER’S ALLEGED CHILD ABUSE: ‘SHE’S A BAD LADY’
Prior to ConneXions, Ruby Franke ran a parenting vlog, or video blog, called 8Passengers, centered around her own family of six children and two parents. But the 8Passengers empire came crumbling down once users started to notice Franke’s unusual behavior and punishments for her children. Ruby Franke stopped posting to the 8Passengers YouTube channel after her last video was uploaded on June 5, 2019.
In earlier videos without Hildebrandt, Franke complained about her children’s school using TikTok to teach dances, the dangers of sleepovers, bullying, and other topics. Some of her videos included her husband, including a “live couples workshop” about managing finances.(YouTube/ ConneXions)
Fox News is not aware of any evidence that Ruby Franke or anyone associated with 8Passengers engaged in any illegal conduct during the period she was actively vlogging on the 8Passengers YouTube channel.
Franke and Hildebrandt were both sentenced to serve up to 30 years in prison.
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Shari also wrote a memoir titled “The House of My Mother,” in which she explains how she and her siblings were listed as 8Passengers LLC’s “employees.”
Shari Franke explained how she tried for years to get the Department of Family and Child Services to take action against her mother in her memoir.(Hulu)
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In dozens of YouTube videos and social media posts, Franke and Hildebrandt coached parents in calm voices from a living room couch on how to raise their children in “truth.” In a video posted just before their arrests, Hildebrandt said pain can be a good thing for children of a certain age.
The case has prompted discussions about how parenting and lifestyle blogs often present only a sliver of a person’s or family’s reality, as well as children’s rights to their own privacy if their parent is a social media star.
SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — A wrongful death lawsuit filed in Utah alleges a counterfeit airbag turned a routine crash into a fatal explosion that killed a teenage driver within minutes.
Alexia De La Rosa graduated from Hunter High School in May of 2025. On July 30, 2025, she was involved in a crash.
The lawsuit alleges that when the vehicle’s driver-side airbag deployed, it detonated and sent metal and plastic shrapnel into the cabin.
MORE | Crashes
A large, jagged piece of metal struck Alexia in the chest, and she died minutes later, according to the complaint.
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The lawsuit, filed by Morgan & Morgan in Utah’s Third Judicial District Court, was brought on behalf of Tessie De La Rosa, as personal representative of the estate of her 17-year-old daughter.
The defendants are AutoSavvy Holdings Inc., AutoSavvy Dealerships LLC, and AutoSavvy Management Company LLC.
Morgan & Morgan alleges that the Hyundai Sonata had previously been declared a total loss after a 2023 crash and issued a salvage title. The suit claims AutoSavvy later purchased the vehicle and had it repaired — during which counterfeit, non-compliant, and defective airbag components were allegedly installed — before reselling it to the De La Rosa family.
The complaint further alleges that AutoSavvy knew or should have known the vehicle contained counterfeit and nonfunctional airbag components when it was sold.
“This is the third wrongful death lawsuit we have filed involving alleged counterfeit airbags that we believe turned survivable crashes into fatal incidents,” Morgan & Morgan founder John Morgan said in a statement. “No life should be cut short because a corporation puts profits above safety.”
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Attorney Andrew Parker Felix, who is leading the case, said the firm is committed to uncovering how allegedly illegal airbag inflators enter the stream of commerce and are installed in vehicles sold to consumers.
“To make this perfectly clear, these are not supposed to be in the United States at all,” Felix said. “They are not approved for use in any vehicle that’s being driven in the United States.”
“They don’t have approval from any governmental agency to be installed in vehicles that are driven within the United States and regulated here,” he added.
Morgan & Morgan says it is investigating at least three additional deaths involving other defendants and alleged counterfeit airbags.
KUTV 2News reached out to AutoSavvy multiple times by email and phone. We were told a member of the company’s legal team would be in touch, but as of publication we have not received a response.
Randall will be among several key visitors in attendance for a meeting on March 6
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) University of Utah President Taylor Randall speaks on campus during an event on Feb. 7.
University of Utah President Taylor Randall is scheduled to meet with President Donald Trump this week.
Randall is expected to be among several attendees at a White House roundtable meeting on Friday to discuss solutions for the rapidly evolving landscape of college athletics with the president, a U. spokesperson said.
The meeting could be postponed, however, due to the war in Iran. As of Monday, “the odds of it happening this week are 50-50 at best,” according to Yahoo Sports.
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If the roundtable happens as scheduled, the guest list includes several current and former notable figures in sports, including NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, golf legend Tiger Woods and former Alabama head coach Nick Saban.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox confirmed in a social media post on X that he would be in attendance as well.
“Thank you [President Donald Trump] for inviting me to participate, and for your commitment to addressing challenges in college sports,” Cox said on X. “[Taylor Randall] is a great university leader who will work with us on solutions for this critical issue.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) University of Utah President Taylor Randall speaks on campus on Feb. 7.
Earlier this year, Randall was called on by the federal House Committee on Education and Workforce to schedule a briefing to discuss the school’s planned private-equity partnership with Otro Capital, according to a report from Sportico.
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The Utes announced their proposal in December of last year, which is a first-of-its-kind agreement between a university’s athletic department and a private equity company.
Utah’s deal with Otro has yet to be finalized. In a Feb. 10 interview with The Salt Lake Tribune, Randall said the university is “still just working through all of the issues systematically.”
“We want to do this in the right way to set both of us up for future success,” he added.
The move is expected to infuse hundreds of millions of dollars into the U.’s athletic department to help sustain the financial future of the program with rising deficits across the industry.
“I don’t think any of us would prefer to be in this situation right now,” Randall said in a faculty senate meeting in January. “But it just is what we’re facing.”
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SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — The 2025-2026 winter season isn’t quite over, but it’s no secret that it’s been a rough one when it comes to snow. Right now, statewide snowpack numbers are hovering around 60% of the median.
But you don’t have to know those numbers to understand what a strange winter it’s been.
“It’s kind of good,” said Carrie Stewart, who lives in Salt Lake City. “I mean, I like it because I like a milder climate. But I realize this summer is going to be hard.”
MORE | Snowpack
“I’m not sad I’m not shoveling,” said Sally Humphreys of Salt Lake City. “But it’s definitely worrying.”
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State water officials are also worried. The clock is ticking to bulk up those snowpack numbers.
“We’re running out of time to get the snowpack that we need,” said Jordan Clayton, supervisor of the Utah Snow Survey. “We have about 40 or so days until our typical snowpack peak.”
There is still some time to make up lost ground, but the odds aren’t great. Clayton estimates a 10% chance of reaching normal by the end of the season.
“Those are terrible odds,” he said.
In fact, the odds of having a record low snowpack are greater, sitting at 20%. It’s a grim reality that has officials looking toward the summer anxiously.
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“I would expect to see watering restrictions outdoors for a lot of places,” said Laura Haskell, Utah’s drought coordinator.
It’s unknown what the next few weeks will bring, but if Haskell had to guess, she doesn’t see state reservoirs filling up much from where they are now.
“In the spring when that runoff hits, we do get a noticeable peak in our reservoir storage,” Haskell said. “The water just starts coming in. But this year, we don’t anticipate getting that.”
Haskell says we have enough reservoir storage to likely make it through the summer, but there are other implications to worry about.
Our autumn season was pretty wet. That led to decent soil moisture levels, which can then lead to higher vegetation growth.
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“If we then have a snowpack that melts out really early, we’ll have a longer than normal summer, if you will, with forage growth that might dry out, and so that’s kind of a bad recipe for promoting fire hazard,” Clayton said.
Utahns have dealt with low snowpack levels in the past. Many Utahns are familiar with their lawn turning brown because of water restrictions.
“We’ll probably just let it go that nice, sandy, golden color that it gets in the summer in a dry climate,” said Dea Ann Kate, who lives in Cottonwood Heights.
As we wait to see what the next few weeks bring, people like Carrie Stewart are just reflecting on an unusual winter.
“It is worrying,” she said. “We need snow. We’ve only shoveled once this season, and that’s very unusual.”
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Water officials are now hoping for something else unusual: climbing out of the snowpack hole that’s been created.
“But there are no times going back where the snowpack totals for the state were close to where they are right now, and we ended up actually at a normal peak,” Clayton said. “So while it’s possible, it’s very unlikely.”
