Utah
In Utah gubernatorial debate, expected fireworks fizzle
Moderation prevailed in Tuesday’s gubernatorial Republican primary debate as Utah Gov. Spencer Cox and state Rep. Phil Lyman, R-Blanding, centered their rhetoric around policy — a departure from Cox’s rowdy reception at state convention and Lyman’s aggressive online campaign messaging.
During the hour-long debate, which Cox cheerfully called “boring,” the first-term governor listed what he considers his legislative achievements, identified his biggest regret and noted the absence of fiery rhetoric coming from his challenger.
“Campaigns bring out the worst in people. We’ve certainly seen that with my opponent’s campaign,” Cox said following the debate hosted by the Utah Debate Commission.
The governor, who has championed “Disagree Better” as chairman of the National Governor’s Association, said he has tried to run a positive campaign this year like he did four years ago.
“It’s so much easier to lie and tear your opponent down,” Cox said. “I’m sad that my opponent has done it — he didn’t do it tonight, he didn’t do it to my face, but he apparently is willing to say and do anything to tear down and get elected.”
Lyman, who has represented southeastern Utah for six years in the state legislature, said the event’s format made the debate more “tame from what would probably be more in my comfort zone.”
Lyman has accused Cox of failing to take a bolder stand on issues like transgenderism, illegal migration and centralizing authority to state government on local issues.
“We see things very differently,” Lyman said following the debate, which was moderated by KUER assistant news director Caroline Ballard. “I’m a bottom-up kind of power dynamic person. Cox is very much a top-down power dynamic person. I think the comparisons is stark.”
Lyman defeated Cox 67.5% to 32.5% in the April GOP convention among 4,000 delegates, many of whom greeted Cox with boos before making him the first signature-gathering incumbent not to meet the party’s 40% threshold at convention since a signature route was established 10 years ago, according to former GOP party chairman Spencer Stokes.
Cox, who is running for his second term in office, is among the most popular governors in the nation. A recent Deseret News-Hinckley Institute of Politics poll found Cox with 62% support among registered Republican voters and Lyman with 25% ahead of the June 25 primary election.
Where do Cox and Lyman stand on housing and immigration?
The governor, who previously served as lieutenant governor under Gary Herbert for seven years, touted tax cuts, abortion restrictions, and investments in public education and school choice as highlights from his first four years. But it is the issue of housing affordability that Cox said carried both his biggest win and regret.
After three years of passing dozens of bills meant to increase the supply of starter homes in Utah, “none of them really made a dent,” Cox lamented. But he said he hopes recent legislative wins will reverse that pattern.
“This is the single most important issue in our state,” Cox said at the top of the debate. “This past session, we worked tirelessly with legislators to pass the most comprehensive housing reform in the United States.”
This year, Cox’s administration led out on a package of regulatory reforms to make it easier for homebuilders and municipalities to construct smaller, cheaper single-family homes, including a bill that would give discount loans to lending institutions that backed affordable housing projects.
Lyman said these policy goals were evidence of Cox’s big government tendencies.
“This is the comforting method we like to tell ourselves, that the government is going to fix this problem,” Lyman said.
Lyman said the best thing the state can do is get out of the way. It is regulations coming out of Salt Lake City that have created incentives for developers to stay away from affordable housing projects, Lyman said. “And throwing money at it is not going to fix the problem.”
Lyman levied this same criticism at the current administration’s approach to water management, attracting out-of-state business and subsidizing expensive sports stadiums. The two candidates voiced their agreement on Utah Fits All scholarships, federal overreach on public lands and abortion being a state issue.
But Lyman said he would do more to address illegal immigration in the state then Utah’s current executive.
“Our policies make us a magnet for illegal immigration, you can see by the numbers,” Lyman said. “And not only that, our policies make us a magnet for non-citizens with criminal intent because of the way that we treat the retention of illegals. We’ve got to take more aggressive stance.”
Lyman said he would flout Biden administration rules that make it difficult to detain migrants in local jails and called on Immigration and Customs Enforcement to increase deportations.
Cox placed the blame for increased immigration levels on Biden policies that have made it so that “every state is a border state.”
What is Utah’s brand?
Despite the “Disagree Better” tone of the debate, the candidates diverged on the need for “aggressive rhetoric” in achieving policy successes.
“I’m very proud to be a conservative Utahn,” Cox said. “But I also believe the way we do things matter. … Our state gets judged by the way that I conduct myself.”
A commitment to treating political opponents with “dignity and respect” is key to Utah’s “brand,” which also includes leading the country in the strength of its economy and communities, Cox said.
But elevating civility above all else ignores the threats Utah faces from “external forces who are not using fair tactics to try to take away what belongs to us,” Lyman said.
“They’re trying to lock up our energy. They’re trying to lock up our land. Trying to shut down or industries. They sue our counties. They go after our people. They raid the homes of our people. They have hurt people’s lives,” Lyman said. “I’m not against polite words, but there’s a point where we have to use aggressive rhetoric.”
Not only the Utah that we are today, but the Utah that we can choose to become.
(Rick Egan | The Salt Lake Tribune) Gabriel Meneses makes one of the limited edition flags for the United States 250th anniversary at Colonial Flag in Sandy on Monday, June 1, 2026.
- President Donald Trump is expected to sign executive orders reducing the size of Utah’s Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments on Monday.
- The monuments have shifted in size between administrations, with Trump reducing them in 2017 and President Joe Biden restoring their original boundaries in 2021.
- Environmental groups and Utah officials are divided over the potential reduction, with critics threatening legal challenges and supporters seeking more local control.
President Donald Trump plans to sign an executive order on Monday afternoon shrinking the size of two national monuments in Utah, which currently cover a combined 5,094 square miles, the Deseret News confirmed on background with a Utah source.
The two national monuments — Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears — have oscillated in size through the previous several presidential administrations.
Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was created by President Bill Clinton in September 1996. Bears Ears National Monument was created by President Barack Obama in December 2016. Both designations received a mixed reception among Utahns.
In 2017, Trump reduced Bears Ears by about 85% and Grand Staircase by about 46%.
Then when former President Joe Biden took office in 2021, he restored them to their original sizes.
Trump is expected to sign the executive orders in the Oval Office on Monday at 4:30 EST.
In a statement to the Deseret News on Friday, the White House said, “Any policy announcement will come directly from the President. This reporting about potential executive orders is pure speculation.”
National monument designations place restrictions on what recreational and economic activity residents and visitors can do on the land. The designation also prohibits anyone from pursuing new mining claims, oil and gas leasing, coal exploration or new commercial infrastructure projects.
However, the Bureau of Land Management previously found that Bears Ears and Grand Staircase have little to offer in terms of oil and gas potential, the Deseret News previously reported.
For nearly three decades since Clinton designated the first monument, Utah’s federal delegation has asked for reductions in land size for more local control, recreation and grazing.
Recently, Utah Rep. Celeste Maloy challenged the monument’s resource management plan to return to a plan the first Trump administration outlined in 2020 with help from local Utahns.
However, her bill died after missing a key deadline to make it to the Senate for a vote.
People react to the potential land reduction
Based on an initial report by ABC4, environmental groups are already vocalizing their disapproval over a potential reduction of monument land.
Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance Executive Director Scott Braden described the potential executive order as “unlawful, unwise and unacceptable,” in a press release sent to the Deseret News.
“This action will only bring uncertainty and chaos to places that should instead be protected for their rich biodiversity, unique geology, and remarkable cultural values,” he wrote. Braden said SUWA was preparing to fight the executive order through lawsuits or by lobbying in Congress.
On X, former Utah state Sen. Nate Blouin referenced the land reduction in conjunction with the Babylon Fire, which as of Friday is 25% contained and has covered more than 100,000 acres in southeastern Utah.
“As the largest wildfire in the U.S. burns pristine landscapes in southeastern Utah, Trump is threatening to shrink both Grand Staircase & Bears Ears National Monuments,” Blouin wrote. “This unprecedented move is happening without input from the region’s ancestral inhabitants.
PROVO — The preliminary hearing for Tyler Robinson is expected to wrap up Friday morning in Provo. But it will still be several weeks before a decision is made on whether there is enough probable cause to bind him over for trial.
Robinson, 23, is charged with 10 crimes, the most serious being aggravated murder, in the death of conservative political activist Charlie Kirk, who was shot and killed on the campus of Utah Valley University on Sept. 10, 2025. A preliminary hearing is held to determine whether there is sufficient probable cause to go to trial on the charges levied against a defendant.
The Utah County Attorney’s Office finished calling their witnesses to testify on Thursday. Robinson’s defense team, who have already called two forensic experts from the FBI and ATF to testify, are expected to call one more on Friday before resting. Robinson has been attempting to cast doubt on the reliability of DNA testing, arguing that test results are subjective.
Prosecutors have objected several times to the line of questioning, arguing that it falls well outside the bounds of what is needed for a preliminary hearing. Even 4th District Judge Tony Graf warned defense attorney Michael Burt on Thursday during one line of questioning, “I feel we are exiting the orbit of probable cause.”
At the end of a preliminary hearing, both sides typically give closing arguments, and the judge decides if there is enough evidence for a defendant to proceed to trial. On Thursday, Graf granted a defense motion for each side to first submit briefs summarizing their arguments. The state will submit its brief by July 28, followed by the defense’s reply on Aug. 11 and the state’s rebuttal on Aug. 18. After that, another hearing will be held on Sept. 1 for both sides to present their cases in court.
Also on Thursday, portions of the video interview of Robinson’s roommate and boyfriend at the time of Kirk’s death, Lance Twiggs, were shown to the courtroom after much debate.
In addition, screenshots of the text messages exchanged between Twiggs and Robinson, a note Robinson left for Twiggs and messages on Discord that Robinson allegedly sent to his friend group prior to turning himself in, were all displayed in court.
For each piece of evidence introduced during the week-long hearing, Graf has had to decide:
- Whether to admit that evidence into the record;
- Whether that evidence should be shown to everyone in the courtroom;
- Whether that evidence can be filmed by the livestream camera broadcasting the hearing.
Robinson’s defense team remains adamant that broadcasting evidence to people outside the courtroom will jeopardize their client’s right to a fair trial by prejudging a future jury pool. Prosecutors want the evidence shown to everyone for the sake of transparency. Graf has compromised on several pieces of evidence by allowing them to be displayed to people in the courtroom but not on the livestream feed.
The extended debates over what evidence can be shown to the public and what is only viewed by attorneys and the judge have prompted Jeff Neiman, the attorney for Erika Kirk and the Kirk family, to address the courtroom several times, both in person and in a briefing filed Wednesday night, calling on the court to make all evidence public.
“For 10 months, the victim’s family has waited for this preliminary hearing. Erika Kirk, the widow of Charlie Kirk, and his grieving parents traveled to this courtroom for one reason: to be present at these proceedings and to bear witness to the evidence concerning the death of their husband and son. At certain points throughout the preliminary hearing, the Kirk family sat in the room while evidence was admitted but not presented for their viewing. They were present in body, yet denied the very thing their presence was meant to secure: their ability to meaningfully observe the preliminary hearing,” Neiman said. “The victim’s family’s position is simple. At a minimum, every exhibit entered into evidence during the preliminary hearing must be visible to every person lawfully present in the courtroom.”
Erika Kirk and Charlie Kirk’s parents have been in the courtroom all week for the preliminary hearing.
At Neiman’s request, Graf agreed that at the end of court on Friday, he will show to the courtroom only the enhanced UVU surveillance video allegedly showing Robinson’s movements across the roof of the Losee Center and when he drops off the roof and runs to a wooded area off Campus Drive. The video includes moments in which film editors zoom in on the alleged gunman and impose a red circle around him to make it easier to view. The video was originally submitted as evidence but was only shown to Graf and attorneys.
Friday’s hearing begins at 9 a.m. Watch it livestreamed here:
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