Rep. Mike Winder, R-West Valley City, is courting Salt Lake County GOP delegates with hot-air balloon rides this Saturday — thanks to an in-kind contribution from Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, a balloon enthusiast.
Winder also led willing delegates on a tour of the State Capitol. He co-hosted a delegate event at Hunter High School with Mitt Romney, and plans delegate events in the next two weeks with Gov. Gary Herbert and House Speaker Greg Hughes.
It’s a lot of work for delegate votes that he now really doesn’t need.
That’s because he is following dual paths to the primary ballot, as allowed by a 2014 law, called SB54. Besides using the caucus-convention system, he’s also collecting signatures of registered Republicans. He needs 1,000 to qualify for the primary, and turned in 1,521 at the deadline to submit them Monday. So he figures he’s in.
Others like Winder who are pursuing both paths to the ballot now may essentially use county conventions to try to quickly eliminate in-party opponents and skip primaries.
Winder did exactly that two years ago to unseat former Rep. Fred Cox — and is seeking to repeat it in a rematch with him this year. Cox is among GOP conservatives on the Republican state central committee who insist the new election law is unconstitutional, and have pushed party lawsuits challenging it. So he did not collect signatures.
As a result, if Winder wins 60 percent of delegate votes at the Salt Lake County GOP convention on April 14 — or roughly 30 of the 50 delegates or so in their district — he would eliminate Cox and proceed directly to the Nov. 6 general election. He did that two years ago.
But if Cox wins 60 percent of the votes, he would not eliminate Winder because he collected enough signatures to appear on the primary ballot anyway.
“The way the system is set up now, collecting signatures is like having a ‘get of jail free card,’” Cox said. “Even if those candidates receive zero votes at the convention, they still advance to the primary.”
Cox said one reason he did not collect signatures is “because I didn’t have an extra $6,000 laying around” to pay commercial signature collectors the $6 per valid signature they charge. He also enjoys campaigning one-on-one with delegates who study issues closely. “I’m very optimistic about my chances at the convention.”
Winder said he used a combination of volunteer and paid signature collectors. He said he is pursuing both pathways to the ballot “because I take very seriously my duty to represent the people of West Valley City,” and “to me it would be reckless not to use both paths” to improve his chances.
He said he loves the caucus-convention system “because delegates are very engaged” and ask many questions. But by also collecting signatures, “We’ve had a wonderful time working with voters who normally are not as engaged, including registering a number of new Republicans along the way.”
A similar situation exists between Rep. Raymond Ward, R-Bountiful, and his GOP challenger Phill Wright, another conservative member of the party state central committee. Ward has enough signatures to qualify for the primary, but also is pursuing convention delegates’ support.
Ward said different types of voters tend to participate in the two paths to the ballot “and I want to represent both of them, and reach out to both of them.”
“I’m not collecting signatures because I support the caucus-convention system,” Wright said. “The best way for me to represent the Utah Republican Party is to be elected by the delegates chosen to represent the party. If I can’t get enough votes at convention for that, then I’m not the right guy.”
Election officials will work to verify before county conventions which candidates using the signature path have enough to qualify for a primary. Most large county conventions are on April 14 and state conventions for multi-county and statewide candidates are on April 21 for Republicans and April 28 for Democrats.
As of Monday, some in county convention contests who already had qualified via the signature route included Republican Dan Johnson seeking the House District 4 seat of retiring Rep. Ed Redd, R-North Logan, and Republicans Glen Jenkins and Melissa Ballard, seeking the seat of retiring Rep. Becky Edwards, R-North Salt Lake.
Others included Democrats Jen Dailey-Provost, Darin Mann, and Igor Limansky seeking the seat of retiring Rep. Rebecca Chavez-Houck, D-Salt Lake City; Republican Brady Brammer, seeking the seat of Rep. Mike Kennedy, R-Alpine, who is running for the U.S. Senate; current Rep. Keith Grover who is seeking to replace retiring Sen. Margaret Dayton, R-Orem; and Republican Calvin Musselman, seeking the seat of retiring Rep. Jeremy Peterson, R-Ogden.
A total of 73 candidates out of the 167 in county or state convention races had declared their intent to also gather signatures. They must submit signatures for verification two weeks before their county or state convention.
