The official responsible for counting ballots in Utah’s second-largest county, Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson, is publicly questioning whether Gov. Spencer Cox legitimately qualified for the ballot and suggesting Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, Utah’s top elections official, be criminally prosecuted.
Davidson is the only elections official in Utah’s 29 counties to raise such doubts.
Earlier this month, he signed a letter, addressed “To Those Who Care,” accusing Henderson of breaking the law. It has been shared in far-right social media groups, which often give credence to conspiracy theories, and has been spread by the Cox ticket’s challenger in the GOP primary election — current write-in gubernatorial candidate and state lawmaker Phil Lyman.
The letter, Davidson told The Salt Lake Tribune, was shared with “some of the legislators and some other individuals I know.”
A spokesperson for the lieutenant governor’s office declined to comment.
“The Lieutenant Governor did not handle the manual candidate signature verification process for statewide candidates according to statute and made a conflict where none would have existed had it been handled properly and transparently,” Davidson wrote in the letter.
He continued, “Penalties for these violations should be pursued to assure the public that the security of elections in Utah are taken seriously. Our elected officials, especially the elected official that is designated as the chief election official, should be held to the same standard of following the Utah State statutes as every other law-abiding citizen.”
Lyman has been accusing both Cox and running mate Henderson of election fraud since before he lost the primary election in June. He and his supporters have in recent days used Davidson’s letter to prop those allegations up.
On Sunday, a few days after Lyman posted the letter, he asked his followers on social media site X, formerly Twitter, “What should be the consequences/penalties for knowingly defrauding an election?”
Many suggested jail time for Cox and Henderson, but several went beyond that — calling for the death penalty for the elected officials. “Public hanging,” one supporter responded, while another said, “Hanging for the whole town to see.” At least two people posted images of nooses.
When State Sen. Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, challenged Lyman to disavow the threats against the governor and lieutenant governor, Lyman posted a screenshot of McKell’s text saying lawyers, which McKell is, would “misunderstand any truth and defend any lie.” Lyman also reiterated his question about what consequences are appropriate for “government officials that defraud the people,” leading to a new round of calls for prison and death.
A spokesperson for the Utah Department of Public Safety said that the office is “aware of these threats.”
“We are staying very vigilant through elections and take all threats seriously. We will continue to monitor the situation and take measures accordingly,” the spokesperson said.
Lyman did not respond to questions about whether he believes Cox or Henderson should be hanged or imprisoned, or if he condones the calls by his supporters for such acts.
Henderson has been subject to threats since she was sworn into office in 2021, two days before the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Last month, the FBI intercepted a suspicious letter addressed to her that contained white powder, and was signed by the “United States Traitor Elimination Army.”
Davidson said he was not aware of the threats that followed the posting of his letter, adding, “I don’t know anybody that would make those kind of threats.”
‘Fulfilled the requirements to qualify’
The letter follows multiple audits of the signature verification process that found that packets submitted by candidates, including Cox and Henderson, were largely valid and properly screened. Reviews by the Legislative auditor and Utah’s state auditor noted that there were some instances in which signatures were erroneously either approved or rejected.
State Auditor John Dougall concluded it was “statistically likely” Cox’s campaign gathered enough signatures to be on the 2024 primary ballot. Following a seperate legislative audit, Senate President Stuart Adams and House Speaker Mike Schultz released a statement saying the audit confirmed that all of the candidates “fulfilled the requirements to qualify to be on the ballot.”
(Utah Legislature) A screenshot shows Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson speaking to the House Government Operations Committee at the Utah Capitol on Wednesday, Feb. 22, 2023.
Referencing the legislative audit, Davidson wrote in the letter, “I would like you to know a few more facts as to what happened behind the scene, to give you some background of what is in the report.”
In an interview, Davidson said he has recently been “working with an attorney” and plans to issue a revised version of the letter. “I think there’s still some issues, but it’s not as great as that letter portrays,” he said.
When asked whether he stands by the statement that “penalties [against Henderson] for these violations should be pursued,” Davidson responded, “Like I said, I misinterpreted the reference to 20A-7-105” — Utah’s elections code regarding signature verification.
One argument in the letter that Davidson stands by is that signatures should be verified by the clerk overseeing the county in which they were collected. All signature packets gathered by the governor’s campaign ahead of the 2024 primary election were verified by the Davis County clerk’s office.
Davidson alleged that “Davis County was very erratic in their signature verification.”
The error rate for Cox’s signatures was 2.4% in the Legislature’s audit and 1.1% in the review by the state auditor.
Davis County Clerk Brian McKenzie responded to Davidson’s letter with one of his own, which has also been posted on social media and shared with The Tribune.
He first saw a copy of Davidson’s undated letter on Friday, McKenzie wrote, and called the Utah County clerk Monday to discuss it.
“While Aaron and I have disagreed on several issues since his election to the office of Utah County Clerk, from my part I have always attempted to show respect to him and his office. After reading his letter, I was disappointed and frustrated with his false statements and accusations found in his letter,” McKenzie wrote, adding, “I requested a retraction of his false statements and a written apology, which he indicated he would not be doing.”
McKenzie went on to rebut each of Davidson’s claims in the letter — including the argument that every signature collected as part of a candidate petition in a county should be verified by the clerk of that county.
Citing several sections of Utah election code, McKenzie wrote, “The Clerk is the election officer and responsible for candidate petitions that are solely within the county not for statewide and multi county offices.”
A pattern of election denial
Questioning the integrity of elections isn’t new for Davidson, who was elected in 2022 to handle Utah County’s ballots.
Ahead of winning the office, Davidson was outspoken about his doubts regarding the results of the 2020 presidential election. On his campaign website, without evidence, he wrote, “Based upon the stories I’ve been receiving from the delegate and the ballot irregularities that they have received and heard of, I would venture to say, the voter rolls are nether [sic] up to date nor accurate.”
He has also questioned the security of ballots cast through the mail. Davidson opted not to provide already-budgeted prepaid postage for this year’s primary election ballots. In the top right corner of Utah County ballots’ envelopes, where postage is usually included, a message read: “POSTAGE REQUIRED IF MAILED.”
Utah County saw the lowest turnout in the state during the June primaries. Although Henderson, who publicly criticized Davidson’s decision, said the USPS would deliver ballots without postage and bill the county, Utah County’s turnout among active, registered voters was 43.6%.
Voting by mail is widely recognized as secure by both election officials and experts, and is widely popular in Utah. An investigation by The Tribune found that in this year’s primary, among 26 counties that made data available on voting methods, 96.7% of ballots cast were those voters received in their mailbox.
(Isaac Hale | Pool) Rep. Phil Lyman speaks to members of the media after a gubernatorial GOP primary debate held at the Eccles Broadcast Center in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, June 11, 2024.
The Deseret News reported Tuesday that Davidson has been tracking some elected officials’ ballots to verify whether they are using postage — a move that one state lawmaker whose ballot has been checked is questioning the legality of.
In a text, Davidson told The Tribune, that he is checking the ballots of ”those that have politicized the stamp/no stamp to make it an issue. So basically [state Sen.] Mike McKell. He politicized my decision not to pay return postage and the system we use tracks how voters return their ballot, so it’s a simple process to look it up.”
Davidson added, “Someone could probably submit a GRAMA request for that information. It’s not classified as a protected record. And in the primary, he returned his ballot through the mail and didn’t put a stamp on it. Which I believe is a disservice to his tax-paying constituents, making them pay for his convenience of not finding a ballot box to return his ballot.”
The Utah Constitution protects the secrecy of ballots, and McKell, who is also Cox’s brother-in-law, said he referred Davidson’s actions to the Utah County Attorney’s office for criminal review.
“I think it’s inappropriate for a county clerk to track any ballot. If he can track and isolate my ballot, he can track anyone in the county,” McKell said. “It also makes me question whether he opened my ballot and reviewed my personal votes. It’s hard to digest. Under the Utah Constitution, we are all afforded a secret ballot. Tracking my ballot for political retribution because he disagrees with me is extremely troubling.”
Last month, the lieutenant governor’s office published a report in which it found several issues with how Davidson’s office conducted the primary election. Among its findings were that the office “did not reconcile the number of voters who checked in to each polling location with the number of ballots cast,” and that the voting process it implemented “lacked key statutory controls and created an environment where fraudulent and/or unauthorized ballots were cast.”
Davidson said he was frustrated that Henderson’s office published the report instead of handling the issues with him directly. “There’s like this overarching thing that they’re trying to find something that I do wrong,” Davidson said.
Update, Oct. 30, 5:40 p.m.• This story has been updated to include details from Davis County Clerk Brian McKenzie’s response to Aaron Davidson’s comments.
