On Oct. 11, The Salt Lake Tribune covered the decision by the Commission on Presidential Debates to hold a vice presidential debate at the University of Utah in October 2020.
The article quoted Utah Senate Majority Whip Dan Hemmert, R-Orem, as saying, “Utah is officially … no longer a fly-over state.”
But one general election campaign event does not a battleground-state make.
Although it’s great Utah has been selected for this opportunity, don’t rent out your house on AirBnB just yet, because what brings a state into play in presidential elections is an unpredictable voting population. You remember, we’re talking about Utah here.
Even though in 2016, 54 percent of Utahns voted any which way but Republican, since Utah’s winner-take-all law gives the single candidate with the most votes in the state all six of our electoral votes, Donald Trump took Utah with less than half of the voting population’s support.
To leave the ranks of fly-over states, all voters in Utah, not just majority voters, have to be relevant … as in a national popular vote. Throwing Utah a bone to make its majority voters feel good (i.e. having Pence show up in 2016, 13 days before the election) just doesn’t cut it.
Bunnie Keen, Salt Lake City