Utah Republicans are tapping the brakes on a bid to use the state’s initiative process to kill a voter-passed anti-gerrymandering law — a move Utah’s top elections official had said injected an “unprecedented” level of chaos into midterm congressional contests.
Instead of an “indirect” initiative to give the supermajority GOP Legislature another chance to strike down an independent redistricting law, a group the party formed will pivot to ask voters directly next year to repeal the law they approved in 2018.
With the Republicans’ indirect initiative withdrawn, seven public hearings scheduled to be held throughout the state Saturday have canceled, as has a hearing before a Utah judge in two weeks.
Despite none of those hearings planned for red Utah’s blue strongholds, including its most populous county, Salt Lake, Utah Democrats had rallied supporters to attend.
Dems vow to fight on
Responding to news that the indirect initiative had been withdrawn, the Utah Democratic Party called the effort “pathetic” and vowed to push back against 2026 attempts to undo the independent redistricting law.
“The Utah Republican Party may continue to try to ignore the will of the voters next year using other tricks,” Utah Democratic Party Chair Brian King said in a statement, “but Utahns will continue to see through the corruption, abuse of power, and overall disrespect. We will be there to support everyday Utahns when it is time for that particular fight, but today we celebrate another win for voters.”
Known as Proposition 4, the 2018 Better Boundaries initiative passed by voters sought to ban partisan gerrymandering and establish an independent redistricting commission.
Lawmakers repealed the law in 2021, drawing their own maps, and were sued. As part of that lawsuit, 3rd District Judge Dianna Gibson ordered the Legislature to adopt new maps compliant with the law ahead of 2026.
Friday, at the end of a two-day court hearing on a new redistricting plan approved by lawmakers, Assistant Attorney General David Wolf, representing the lieutenant governor’s office, told Gibson that the Utah GOP had withdrawn its “indirect” legislative initiative papers seeking to repeal Prop 4.
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Plaintiffs' attorney Mark Gaber cross-examines testimony by Sean Trende during a hearing on congressional redistricting maps before Judge Dianna Gibson in 3rd District Court in Salt Lake City on Friday, Oct. 24, 2025.
“Once again, political insiders’ attempts to undermine the people’s voice and repeal Proposition 4 have fallen flat, at least for now. This is a win in our ongoing fight to give Utahns the reforms they voted for in 2018,” said Elizabeth Rasmussen, executive director of Better Boundaries.
‘A tight and chaotic process’
The indirect initiative — which has seemingly never been used in Utah — allows groups to gather just over 70,000 signatures from registered voters to force the Legislature to vote on a specific measure.
In this case, its aim was to compel lawmakers to vote on a repeal of the independent redistricting law. Although the Utah Supreme Court previously ruled that the Legislature’s earlier repeal of the initiative was unconstitutional, the GOP believed the indirect initiative would trump the first and make the repeal valid.
“Just with the new map, it was already a tight and chaotic process,” Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, a Republican who oversees Utah’s elections, previously said in an interview. “This is injecting a level of chaos and confusion into this process that is completely unprecedented.”
Plaintiffs challenging Utah’s congressional maps — the League of Women Voters, Mormon Women for Ethical Government and a number of Utah residents — sued over the effort. They argued that an indirect legislative initiative, which is in law, not the Constitution, can’t reverse a voter-passed initiative like Prop 4.
“Recent legal filings by those opposed to our defense of representative government made it clear that the Lieutenant Governor’s Office would likely be forced to deny the indirect initiative application,” Utahns for Representative Government, the group behind Republicans’ initiative, wrote in a statement. The group added that court battles “would have made it impossible to meet statutory deadlines.”
Among the GOP sponsors of the new “direct” initiative aiming to appear on ballots next year are “indirect” initiative backers Attorney General Derek Brown and former U.S. Rep. Rob Bishop. U.S. Sen. Mike Lee has added his name to the group. Papers for that effort were filed Friday.
“For those who claim to believe in the initiative process, they should welcome our effort,” Utah Republican Party Chair Robert Axson said in a statement. “The only difference is that our initiative restores the constitutional order that Proposition 4 disrupted.”
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Katharine Biele, center left, from League of Women Voters, is joined by Malcolm and Victoria Reid, plaintiffs of a lawsuit that resulted in the negation of Utah’s current congressional districts, as she comments after courtroom arguments.
Katharine Biele, president of the Utah chapter of the League of Women Voters, said in an interview, “It was wise for them to withdraw their indirect initiative. As far as I know, it’s never been done in Utah. They will find out just how difficult a real initiative is. We went through it in 2018, and it was hard.”
Midterms may still be forced to rely on old maps
The Republican Party’s push for a referendum to repeal a congressional map adopted by the Legislature is still moving forward. While lawmakers picked the map the party supported, officials say they object to the courts dictating to the Legislature what boundaries should be used.
While a vote on repealing the map wouldn’t take place until November 2026, if the party gathers enough signatures — nearly 141,000 across 15 of 29 state Senate districts — the enacted map would be put on hold and could not be used in the 2026 U.S. House midterm elections.
The deadline for collecting those signatures is Nov. 15 — 40 days after the legislative session in which the law passed. Then, county clerks have three weeks to verify the signatures, after which voters who signed on have 45 days to withdraw their name, if they choose.
That referendum could create problems for the lieutenant governor’s office as well as the county clerks who administer elections
It would mean they may not know whether the GOP met the signature requirement until January. Henderson has told the court that a map needs to be in place no later than Nov. 10 so clerks can prepare to conduct next year’s election, and so candidates can file to run in their respective districts.