As President Donald Trump pushes for an end to mail-in voting nationally, some of Utah’s top Republican elected officials are defending both the state’s vote-by-mail system and the president.
“I think President Trump and all of us are right to be extremely cautious when it comes to mail-in voting,” Republican Gov. Spencer Cox said at his monthly news conference Thursday. But, he added, “Utah is an outlier when it comes to the way that we implemented vote by mail — the time that we took, the processes that we’ve gone through, the changes that we’ve made over time … to make sure that mail-in voting is safe.”
Cox went on to argue that other states, particularly those that implemented vote-by-mail during the COVID-19 pandemic “virtually overnight,” did not develop systems as secure as Utah’s.
“It’s very reasonable for someone to see that and say, ‘Vote by mail is problematic, and we need to make sure that that voting is secure,’” he said.
(Rick Egan | The Salt Lake Tribune) Gov. Spencer Cox speaks with members of the media during the PBS Utah GovernorÕs Monthly News Conference at the Eccles Broadcast Center in Salt Lake City onThursday, August 21, 2025.
Utah first allowed counties to conduct elections entirely by mail in 2012, and in the years since, Utah has been a rare red state to embrace the practice, which has boosted turnout and been popular among voters.
And the constitution, Cox said, is clear: Voting is in the purview of states, and not the federal government.
“I think states should defend that,” Cox said. “But we can do both things. We can defend the role of the states and be very serious about voter integrity.”
Cox said he thinks some states “need to be more serious about voting integrity” and that Utah is happy to share how the state has changed and built in security features to its vote-by-mail system.
Rep. Burgess Owens, who represents Utah’s 4th Congressional District, shared a similar sentiment about Utah’s elections Thursday.
Following an appearance at the University of Utah, the congressman said he believes the federal government should have some control over voting systems.
“Utah is getting it right, because we want to do it right — fairly and be predictable,” Owens said of the state’s vote-by-mail practices. “The problem is, across the country, [it] is not the same way.”
The U.S. needs a federal voting system that is “predictable” and has “no chance of fraud or cheating,” he said. He went on to claim, without evidence, that Trump is looking to end the practice of vote-by-mail because, in some states, people are stuffing ballots but don’t seem to face consequences.
“I would say if everybody did it the way Utah does it, we would not have this conversation,” Owens added.
When asked if he believes states should control their own voting systems, Owens said yes — to an extent.
“There’s certain things that have a federal impact. President is one,” the congressman told reporters. “There’s certain things [that should be left to the] states because it only impacts them, but when it comes down to federal [elections], then it really is we the people, all of us, and if there’s any cheating going on, all of us are impacted by that. If it’s done right, done fairly, all of us are blessed by that.”
The comments from Cox and Owens on Thursday follow a Monday announcement from Trump that he planned to lead a “movement” to end mail-in voting nationally, reiterating election security conspiracy theories he has long peddled. Sen. Mike Lee, Utah’s senior federal delegate, offered his support for the plan.
Despite the claims made by the president and his allies, mail-in voting has been consistently proven safe and secure.
“The reality is that mail ballots have been successfully used in the United States for over 150 years, and in that time, states have developed multiple layers of security to protect against malfeasance,” the nonpartisan voting rights organization Brennan Center for Justice noted on their website.
“Voter fraud related to ballots sent by mail or placed in drop boxes is extremely rare,” the organization wrote. “[S]o rare that multiple analyses have shown that it is more likely that someone will be struck by lightning than commit mail ballot fraud.”