Gov. Spencer Cox had a message for Californians looking to relocate to Utah: Stay in California.
Cox and Gov. Phil Murphy, D-N.J., took questions from reporters outside the White House on Friday after the nation’s governors met with President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and other senior administration officials. Murphy is the National Governors Association chairman and Cox is the vice chairman.
The first question was about “population movement,” specifically what New Jersey is doing to retain residents and what Utah is doing to attract them.
Murphy said New Jersey has “never been hotter” and the state has spent a lot of money and energy making it an affordable place for families to live.
“We’re having the opposite problem,” Cox said, noting the last census confirmed that Utah was the fastest growing state in the country over the past 10 years.
“Our biggest problems are more growth-related. We would love for people to stay in California instead of coming as refugees to Utah.”
Cox said Utah’s biggest problems are housing and water.
“That’s where our focus is,” he said. “We’re not working to attract more people. We’re doing just fine that way.”
Later in the press conference a reporter asked Cox what he meant by saying people in California should stay there.
“What I mean is, we’ve had a lot of people move from California into our state. Growth is our biggest issue right now. So we would love to see California cutting taxes and regulations. I think that would be good,” Cox said.
In their meeting with the Biden administration, the nation’s governors discussed economic issues, infrastructure investment, immigration, energy and fentanyl.
“We like to think the National Governors Association is a beacon of bipartisan reality, an organization that really strives to find common ground,” Murphy said.
Cox described the meeting as “wonderful.” Americans, he said, are hungry for bipartisanship.
Earlier this week, Murphy and Cox issued a statement urging Congress and the administration to work together to ensure a bipartisan solution to increase or suspend the debt limit as soon as possible as well as consider long-term reforms to reduce the national debt and put the country on more sustainable fiscal footing
Murphy said the governors didn’t get into the issue in detail but that he walked away with some optimism. He said he believes there will be reasonable discussions to preserve Social Security, Medicare and national defense.
Cox echoed that sentiment.
“I left more optimistic, not because of details but because of a willingness to have those discussions and those negotiations. The president seemed to be a willing participant and that makes me feel better,” he said.
Immigration also came up during the meeting. Murphy said the group didn’t reach any conclusions but noted Cox made the point that “we’re all border states right now.”
“No necessarily news to break but it was open and constructive,” Murphy said.
Cox said they talked extensively about securing the border both regarding the flow of immigrants and fentanyl as well as what could be done to fix legal immigration.
Biden, he said, also talked about the need for seasonal and farm workers and those with doctoral degrees. “I think there is some bipartisan agreement on that,” Cox said.
In addition to participating in National Governors Association meetings in Washington, Cox attended the State of the Union address as the guest of Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee.