Utah has paid over $500,000 to the law firm championing its Supreme Court attack on federal control over public lands — while budgeting twice as much on a blitz to influence the court of public opinion this summer and fall.
Clement & Murphy filed Utah’s lawsuit in August, challenging the Bureau of Land Management’s ownership of 18.5 million acres of land “unappropriated” to parks, monuments or other national sites in the state.
Between June and November, the state expects to spend $1.35 million — on a website, podcasts, billboards and other advertisements in Utah and Washington, D.C. — under its contract with Utah-based public relations firm Penna Powers, according to records obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune. Utah expects to pay the firm a total of $2.642 million over five years, the contract said.
Other documents released in response to The Tribune’s open records request detail the state’s strategy for increasing “awareness” that the BLM’s oversight and policies for public land in the West “are harming Utahns by restricting access to public lands, hindering active management, and reducing economic and recreation opportunities.”
That strategy includes messaging on a podcast hosted by journalist Bari Weiss ($12,750) and advertisements placed in The Washington Post ($105,885), The Wall Street Journal ($62,500) and National Review ($54,560). The Tribune received $25,000 for ads placed on its website and newsletters.
The burst of taxpayer spending is aimed at shaping public opinion, the documents show — though Supreme Court justices are the ones who will decide whether or not to hear Utah’s arguments. The justices could reject Utah’s filing and tell the state to pursue its case with a lower court first, rather than taking jurisdiction over it themselves.
In a September interview with the Deseret News, Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, said lawyers representing the state urged the public relations campaign. Schultz said he was not immediately available to comment to The Tribune.
“We want the Supreme Court to hear this argument. And so they recommended that we do a little bit of public outreach to talk about that,” Schultz told the Deseret News.
“So they did feel like that was important to make sure that, one, we could be successful with educating, I think, some of the clerks at the Supreme Court,” he continued, “and to maybe help our chance that they’ll take this lawsuit up.”
The campaign planned to pay for geofencing to target the display of its messages to “government buildings,” the documents obtained by The Tribune showed.
Spending on the lawsuit
The state has paid lead attorney Paul Clement $2,300 per hour for his work, according to the Center for Western Priorities, an environmental nonprofit that cited records it obtained under its own records request. Junior Attorney Joseph DeMott’s rate was $1,100 per hour, the center said.
Utah has paid Clement & Murphy, PLLC, based in Virginia, a total of $518,490 since 2023 to litigate the case, according to the state auditor’s Transparent Utah website.
A spokesperson for the Utah Attorney General’s Office confirmed Friday that the state is paying the firm only for work on the public lands lawsuit. When the state’s brief was filed in August, the office said the lawsuit was the product of “decades of legal analysis.”
Gov. Spencer Cox signed HB3002 into law in June; it named the state’s “Federal Overreach Restricted Account,” which “allows for account funds to be used for educating the public on federalism issues.” Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes said in August that the Legislature has set aside about $20 million for its public lands lawsuit.
One common legal strategy for encouraging action by a court is filing “amicus” or “friend of the court” briefs, which groups use to support or expand on a litigant’s arguments. Eleven briefs have been filed by states, counties and other groups that support Utah’s stance.
Ad campaign spending in D.C.
A third of the $1.35 million the state planned to spend this year was targeted to audiences in Washington D.C., including “policy/legal advisors” and “decision-makers” in September and October, according to a July media plan.
The federal government’s response to Utah’s request to proceed in front of the Supreme Court was originally due on Oct. 22. But on Oct. 7, the court granted the government’s request for an extension to Nov. 21.
Here’s the shopping list drafted by Utah’s Public Lands Policy Coordinating Office and Penna Powers for September and October in D.C.:
The $105,885 to The Washington Post, which included $35,295 for its custom “Capitol Hill” wraps and inserts, which the Post promises will “engage the most influential policy makers in Washington.” The rest was for website ads.
$65,125 to The Dispatch, a conservative online magazine, for podcasts and newsletter sponsorships.
The $62,500 to The Wall Street Journal for its “Policy Impact Bundle,” which includes messaging in its Politics & Policy newsletter and Potomac Watch podcast.
$12,750 to appear on “Honestly with Bari Weiss,” hosted by the co-founder of The Free Press.
The $54,560 to National Review, a conservative magazine, which included $7,060 for the back cover of the November issue.
$50,000 for social media advertising, including “Meta (FG/IG)” and “X.”
Nearly $100,000 for advertising, including $30,000 for ads with geofencing to deliver them to government buildings; $60K for ads targeted to unspecified audiences; and $9,180 for “paid search” ads tied to keywords.
Ad campaign spending in Utah
After a bid process, the Public Lands Policy Coordinating Office, housed under the Utah Department of Natural Resources, initially entered into a five-year, $500,000 contract with Penna Powers in February to provide “media relations, marketing, and communications.”
The state amended that contract — increasing the budget from $500,000 to $2.642 million — in July ‘“without competition,” records show. A DNR spokesperson said the original contract noted the possibility of a future increase in the budget.
Here’s the shopping list for this summer and fall in Utah:
$250,000 to “local broadcast TV stations” between August and October.
$150,000 to “interstate billboards” between August and the week of Nov. 4.
$80,000 to “connected TV/YouTube” between August and October.
$80,000 to “local radio stations” between August and October.
$50,000 to “podcasts + audio streaming” between August and October.
$75,000 to “Meta (FB/IG), Reddit, Twitter” between August and October.
$65,000 to “local publishers + sponsored articles” between August and October.
$60,000 to Facebook and Instagram, between July and early September.
$25,000 to The Tribune for “sitewide display/newsletters” and a “native article” between July and August.
$25,000 to ads tied to “paid search” between July and early September.
$20,000 to KSL for “sitewide display” and a “native article” between July and August.
$20,000 to the Deseret News for “sitewide display/newsletters” and a “native article” between July and August.
Aaron Weiss, deputy director for the Center of Western Priorities, is critical of the state’s spending on advertising.
“This is a PR campaign disguised as a lawsuit,” Weiss said. “Two-point-six million is a lobbying campaign, and there’s no reason to spend that money if you’re convinced your legal arguments have merit.”
Environmental groups argue Utah and other Western states agreed to relinquish public lands as a condition of statehood.
In its filings, Utah argues the Supreme Court should take the case because “the time has come to bring an end to this patently unconstitutional state of affairs,” referring to the BLM’s continuing control over “unappropriated” public land inside Utah’s boundaries.
“Nothing in the Constitution authorizes the United States to hold vast unreserved swathes of Utah’s territory in perpetuity, over Utah’s express objection,” the state contends, “without even so much as a pretense of using those lands in the service of any enumerated power.”
At the August press conference when the state announced its lawsuit, Cox said that the federal government has “failed” to manage the Beehive State’s public land. “Utah deserves priority when it comes to managing this land,” he said. “Utah is in the best position to understand and respond to the unique needs of our environment and communities.”
Correction, 1:30 p.m., Nov. 5, 2024 • This story has been updated to clarify that the state’s amended contract with Penna Powers was awarded without competition.
