A trove of Sen. Mike Lee’s messages surrounding the Jan. 6, 2021, seditious assault on our Capitol has featured prominently in the news of late. Pundits have asked pointedly how he can explain what seem to be aggressively energetic efforts around that time to thwart President Joe Biden’s electoral certification.
Whatever weight those questions might carry elsewhere, Mike Lee remains a Utah hometown hero. Observers at Utah’s recent Republican convention were united in their description of his reception there: Rock star!
Of course Lee is celebrated in Utah. He is a near perfect personification of certain bedrock “Utah way” qualities. Among these is a slavish fealty to Moroni-like “strong and mighty” men that is baked, along with other unsavory leavenings, into the culture here. Hence the natural affinity so many Utahns feel for Donald J. Trump, whose crass, bullying bluster apparently is sufficient to paper over his manifest business and social failures.
So powerful is that pull that it drew Lee from his initially sober Trump assessment (Lee urged Trump to step down from his candidacy before he became the Republican nominee) to literally comparing him with Moroni. Supporting a corrupt executive was simply the price required to maintain and consolidate power. Which introduces another pillar of “The Utah Way:” holding and exercising raw political power.
Convincing evidence is readily available. As The Salt Lake Tribune reported in January 2020:
“The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints recorded its smallest membership growth in Utah in at least three decades this past year. And, in 2019, 14 of the state’s 29 counties saw the actual number of members decline.
“The most significant drop came in Salt Lake County, which saw the roster of Latter-day Saints fall by 6,710 even as the state’s largest county grew by 10,000 people.”
Trends of this sort naturally threaten the political primacy of the LDS Church, which has effectively dictated Utah’s politics since Brigham Young and his followers first entered the Salt Lake Valley. In response, stalwart defenders of Mormonism occupying the Utah Legislature sprang into action to ensure Utahns, long-time citizens and new arrivals alike, don’t forget who in fact holds actual political power here (Latter-day Saints hold nine of every 10 seats in Utah’s Legislature.)
Hard-to-miss demonstrations of that “Utah Way” include passage of Utah’s first (and only, so far) in the nation legal alcohol limit for driving to .05% from .08%, a performative move that accomplished exactly nothing other than reminding Utahns that the LDS Church is adamantly opposed to alcohol consumption. (Never mind the old saw that Mormons don’t recognize each other in the liquor store.)
Other evidence? In what must have come as a terrible shock to established leadership, Utah’s citizens mounted a successful ballot initiative to legalize cannabis use for medical purposes. As heretical, those same citizens successfully passed an initiative to have an independent commission draw voting districts following the recent census.
Our legislators, ever mindful of their responsibility to maintain Utah’s traditional order, overrode the citizen’s cannabis initiative in many respects and completely ignored the redistricting initiative. As reported on Fox13, “Sen. Derek Kitchen tried to reinstate Proposition 4 as passed by voters, creating an independent redistricting commission all over again. It never even got a hearing.”
The same fate befell initiatives passed on Medicaid expansion and minimum wage.
What to do with pesky citizens insisting that their secular priorities deserve serious legislative action? (Each of these popular issues had repeatedly been rejected by lawmakers over the years.) Why, introduce HB136, to make the already arduous process of getting initiatives on the ballot even more onerous.
Piling on further, there is the ever-contentious matter of Utah’s federal lands, our “Mighty 5″ National Parks in particular. Utah’s red rock country is a massive driver of tourism and tourism-generated revenue. But those exquisite archeological phenomena belong to United States citizens at large, not Utahns. An outrageous usurpation that commands endless litigation and all of the resources that entails. Wresting control of those assets from the federal government, whose resources are well suited to the purpose, to Utah, has become an article of faith with our political class. Instead, Utah’s resources are dedicated to befouling Salt Lake Valley’s air via the inland port, jeopardizing Utahn’s health via inaction on the shrinking Great Salt Lake (and the foreseeably poisonous consequences of its dry lakebed) and the threat of more liberal Utahns gaining a modicum of political power by mandating fairly drawn voting districts.
No, Mike Lee fits the “Utah Way” to a tee. As long as he maintains an R next to his name and aligns himself closely with those controlling the levers of political power, his seat is safe.
That is, until contrarian factions are able to set aside the “perfect” (Republican, Democrat and Independent candidates on the ballot) for the “good” (Mike Lee and a viable candidate to defeat him on the ballot). That train has now left the station. Those tired of his craven opportunism now have reason to hope he will be riding it out of the United States Capitol in November.
Thomas Walker
Thomas Walker is a native of Salt Lake City. After many years working in the hospitality industry, he retired following a stint teaching skiing with Vail Resorts in Park City. He also is a board member of the Alta Historical Society.