- 27% of Utah voters support eliminating Prop 4, 32% oppose it and 41% don't know.
- GOP effort to repeal Prop 4 is on track to qualify with over 225,000 total signatures.
- But a signature removal campaign has resulted in thousands of removal requests.
The past month of Utah redistricting chaos has left voters as uncertain as ever about the fate of Proposition 4, according to a new Deseret News/Hinckley Institute of Politics poll.
More than 4 in 10 Utah voters remain undecided on whether the state should reverse the map-drawing law, a nearly identical share as a month prior despite extensive messaging by supporters and detractors.
When asked about the ballot proposition to undo Prop 4, 27% said they supported eliminating Utah’s independent redistricting commission, 32% said they opposed it and 41% said they did not know.
The poll, conducted from Feb. 11 to 14, in the final days of signature gathering for the repeal petition, mirrored the month before, with a slight uptick in support and opposition within the margin of error.
“When Proposition 4 passed, it was narrow, and a lot has happened since then,” Hinckley Institute director Jason Perry said. “When 4 in 10 voters are unsure about a particular issue, it shows the issue itself is not defined in their minds.”
How did Utah get here?
In 2018, Utah voters narrowly approved the Prop 4 ballot initiative to create a commission that would advise the Legislature on congressional district maps every decade according to partisan fairness criteria.
The new law quickly became one of the most explosive topics in Utah politics.
After seven years of legislative opposition, contentious litigation and Republican protest, Prop 4 spurred new levels of polarization in recent weeks as efforts to repeal it accelerated, attracting national attention.
The GOP-sponsored petition to put Prop 4 before voters again spiraled into reports of violence toward signature gatherers, claims of misleading tactics by gatherers and a coordinated signature removal campaign.
This came amid endorsements from President Donald Trump, Ted Nugent, Donald Trump Jr. and Scott Presler; a last-minute push from conservative turnout operation Turning Point Action; and a new federal lawsuit.
Support for the Prop 4 repeal clearly diverges along partisan lines. Support among Republicans sits at 35%, then falls to 23% among Democrats — 51% of whom oppose it — and 16% among independents.
Serving as a backdrop to the Prop 4 repeal effort is a yearslong legal saga beginning in 2022.
Following a landmark Utah Supreme Court ruling in 2024, a district judge rejected Utah’s 2021 map in August and replaced it with one submitted by advocacy groups in November, creating a new Democratic district.
The large share of voters who say they don’t know what to think about the Prop 4 repeal effort aren’t ignorant, Perry said, rather they are likely undecided because they have seen what the actual application of Prop 4 is.
“Voters who were at the time thinking an independent redistricting commission is exactly what they’re looking for, they’re looking at all that has happened in the middle of that and they need to make up their mind,” Perry said.
Where does the Prop 4 repeal stand?
On Sunday, Utahns for Representative Government, the committee funding the initiative, submitted its last drop of signature packets, bringing the estimated total to over 225,000, according to the group’s director.
On Friday morning, the Utah Lieutenant Governor’s Office had recorded over 117,000 verified signatures, a lagging indicator of signatures verified by county clerks, who have until March 7 to review every packet.
With a statewide signature rejection rate of around 25%, according to the state’s VISTA system, the effort appears on track to reach 170,000 verified signatures, significantly above the initiative threshold of 141,000.
“This polling confirms what many on the other side have tried to ignore: this issue remains unsettled. Utahns have strong opinions and are deeply divided,” Utah GOP chair Robert Axson said in a statement to the Deseret News.
“With significantly more than 200,000 signatures gathered in less than 100 days, the path forward is clear — let the people vote,“ Axson continued. ”Efforts to pressure voters to withdraw their name for the purpose to avoid a public vote should end immediately. Utahns deserve the final say, not an appointed judge.”
The signature rejection rate varies widely. In Salt Lake County, the average rejection rate is roughly 35%, falling to 30% in Weber County, 25% in Utah County and 14% in Davis and Washington counties.
But this does not account for the organized effort to undermine the GOP’s Prop 4 repeal petition.
Earlier this month, Better Boundaries, the nonprofit group behind Prop 4, said it sent thousands of letters encouraging voters who signed the GOP’s petition to contact county clerks to get their name removed.
“Utah voters made their voices clear in 2018 when they created the independent redistricting commission, and this new poll shows they still want it protected,” Better Boundaries director Elizabeth Rasmussen said.
Rasmussen continued in a statement to the Deseret News: “Utahns oppose eliminating the commission by a clear margin. Fair maps should not be drawn by politicians with a stake in the outcome.”
Salt Lake County has received by far the greatest number of requests to remove signatures, at around 2,000, followed by roughly 500 in Utah County, 300 in Weber County and 150 in Washington County.
What’s next for Prop 4?
Utah has become saturated with news, accusations and misinformation surrounding Prop 4. This suggests the poll’s significant share of “don’t know” respondents are likely aware but unsure about the issue, according to Perry.
For the GOP and Better Boundaries, this means a lot of work lies ahead to persuade voters. But it also means that both sides need to articulate a clear explanation that voters feel is not trying to lead them astray, Perry said.
If the Prop 4 repeal initiative qualifies for the ballot, it is likely to trigger “a tremendous amount of money being spent to educate the public on why they think that this needs to be undone, the practical and political implications,” Perry said.
The Prop 4 redistrict saga has already put the spotlight on Utah as an unlikely swing state that could shape the congressional majority in 2026. The newly created 1st Congressional District would have handed Kamala Harris a 24-point win in 2024.
Getting Prop 4 on the ballot in November would ensure that national interests, from both sides of aisle, pour even more money into Utah’s map-drawing mayhem. It is yet to be seen whether this will further convince, or confuse, Utah’s ballot initiative voters.