Former Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema responded to two shouting protesters during an event on Friday with Utah Gov. Spencer Cox by underscoring the importance of civil disagreement to navigate America’s economic and political disruption.
Shortly after Sinema and Cox took the stage, at the annual economic outlook summit hosted by the Utah Chamber of Commerce and the University of Utah’s Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute, shouts filled The Grand America Hotel ballroom.
Two men, separated by less than five minutes, stood up and started to yell, apparently in reference to a lawsuit against Sinema alleging an improper relationship between the former senator and a member of her security team.
Both men were quickly removed from the room and were trespassed from the property. Neither of them were charged with breaking the law, according to the Salt Lake City Police Department.
As the first man was being escorted out of the room, Cox said the protest was “good evidence of the state of the world today.” Sinema then introduced what became the theme of her comments, “disruption,” and joked she “didn’t plan that.”
“We are living in disruptive times,” Sinema said. “The standard — kind of the expected, the usual — all out the window because the rules don’t apply any longer.”
Sinema wasn’t just referring to the outbursts that temporarily interrupted the event. Managing — and sometimes creating — disruption is essential for leaders in business and elected office, she said.
While serving in the Senate, Sinema received praise and ire for her central role in dooming the $3.5 trillion Build Back Better Act, making the Inflation Reduction Act more business friendly and negotiating the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.
Shortly before declaring her departure from the Democratic Party to become an independent, Sinema collaborated with former Utah Sen. Mitt Romney to pair religious liberty protections with a federal recognition of same-sex marriage in the Respect for Marriage Act.
The “core Senate values” that enabled these compromises to pass — including generosity, thoughtfulness and tolerance — are also what “set Utah apart,” with “two just notable exceptions today,” Sinema said in reference to the hecklers.
“Even in this time of historic disruption, Utahns have, in my opinion, better than any other state, managed to hold on to that in a way that most other states have maybe not focused on or have just kind of ignored,” Sinema said.
As the spokesperson for “Disagree Better,” and the face of the government response to the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk in September, Cox said he’s learned that “that value system still exists across the rest of the country.”
Cox: Americans want civil, moral leadership
Americans “are hungry” for leadership that demonstrates civility and morality, according to Cox. This is not reflected by some elected officials because of a political “market failure” that Cox said requires voters to be more intentional.
Since her retirement from the Senate in 2024, Sinema has worked as the president and CEO of an advocacy organization, Arizona Business Roundtable, which lobbies for more artificial intelligence data centers in her home state of Arizona.
Good leadership is also needed to guide communities through the “period of disruption” with AI entering the workforce, Sinema said, noting a Gardner Institute graph showing a reduction in tech jobs since AI tools became more accessible.
Many of the largest policy dilemmas facing the U.S., including AI regulation, national debt and welfare reform, are not seeing action in Congress because Americans have endorsed electoral incentives that produce a politics of “ugliness,” Sinema said.
“Right now in our political system, we dramatically punish those who go to the middle and find a compromise and do the boring work of finding the solutions, and we reward those who make a lot of noise on the edges and do nothing,” Sinema said.
Sinema concluded by telling the room of industry leaders, legislators and lobbyists they should support quality candidates who can respectfully work through “different ideas” because that is what “will protect our democracy long term.”
The half-day conference included a state-of-the state economic report from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute.