We are people like you — people with deep roots and values that reflect our state. Neither of us originally planned to run for governor or lieutenant governor. I decided to jump into the ring on Jan. 31, when the other six Republican candidates at the Silicon Slopes debate publicly pledged allegiance to President Donald Trump.
I wanted to give Republicans a choice for governor who was from neither the far right nor the political establishment. Last month, I selected Dr. Joseph Jarvis, a public health expert — so needed in our current and future leadership — to be my running mate, and we have worked hard to secure a place on the ballot through the signature-gathering process.
We were well on the way to getting the needed signatures when the governor told everyone to stay home. Our campaign became a casualty of COVID-19 overnight.
Not being able to meet you face to face and gather your signatures because of the governor’s mandate has forced our campaign to play by a very different set of rules than the other gubernatorial campaigns, who entered the race earlier. Not only were the rules for us different, they made getting enough signatures totally impossible.
Governors in other states recognized this problem and took action. From New York to Oregon, governors have adjusted the election process in defense of democracy. They have extended the time provided or lowered the signature thresholds required in proportion with the time that was truncated by stay-at-home orders. Our governor and lieutenant governor have refused to do this. Their failure to act has denied us any reasonable path to the ballot and trampled on Utahns’ rights to a free and fair election.
You have the right to choose your state leadership. That right cannot be taken away by a pandemic, even one as unprecedented as this. Utah’s democracy has weathered world wars and economic depressions. We must not let it die now. We are waging this crusade because in America it is the people, not politicians or pandemics, who choose our next leaders. This is about your rights as much as ours.
During this crisis, we’ve seen Gov. Herbert limiting our constitutional rights to public assembly and religious worship. We agree that these temporary restrictions are necessary to save lives. Yet while he makes these grand changes to our lives, he feigns helplessness about changing signature-gathering requirements. This is false. If the governor can change one, he can easily change the other. We’ve also appealed to our state legislature. But our legislators, too, have admitted they have “little stomach” for adjusting an election process that favors their incumbency.
The American system of checks and balances is meant to keep any one part of government from infringing on the rights of the people. Our judicial system is part of that wise, treasured concept. So we are pursuing the only avenue open to us—a lawsuit against Gary Herbert and Spencer Cox for willfully creating a barrier between the people of Utah and their right to choose their next governor.
George Washington warned us “in the most solemn manner” of our worst enemy, namely, “when absolute power of an individual ... turns this to his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.”
This is not a fight we asked for, but it is a fight worth waging. Like Washington, we want nothing more than “good laws under a free government”—one selected by the people of Utah, not appointed by a few men in power. We are asking the court to reclaim the most basic right we all cherish — a free, fair, and full choice in our next election.
Jan Garbett is a Utah businesswoman, mother of 8, and a Republican candidate for governor of Utah. Joe Jarvis has spent a lifetime in public health. He is Jan’s running mate for lieutenant governor.