During his monthly press conference on Thursday, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox commented on the thousands of signatures collected in support of a referendum against a ban on public sector collective bargaining.
On Wednesday, the Protect Utah Workers coalition submitted over 320,000 signatures in an effort to get HB267, a law that prohibits public sector collective bargaining, repealed.
Cox congratulated the unions on their effort and how many signatures they were able to gather, adding that he knows how hard it can be to gather signatures.
“People ask if I was surprised and I said, ‘I’m actually not surprised.’ It’s called organized labor for a reason,” he said. “This is one of the few areas where you can actually do something like that, because the organizations are already in place. And so I fully expected that we would have a referendum on this.”
The governor said that he didn’t like the bill from the beginning, adding that it wasn’t something he was interested in or would have run himself. Cox added that he warned legislators who supported this bill that it could actually strengthen the unions by bringing them together against it.
When asked why he didn’t veto the bill, Cox said, “I sign lots of bills I don’t like for lots of different reasons.”
He added that it is very hard to veto a bill early in the session. Cox said he believes in portions of the bill and emphasized that there is very little collective bargaining that actually takes place in the state.
Cox also shared that he likes referendums.
“I think that’s healthy. I really do. I think it’s good for our democracy, for our republic.” the governor said. “I don’t like initiatives, but I do like referendums because it is a check on the legislative power. It’s a powerful check.”
He added that the power of a referendum can only be used rarely in the case of significant backlash, and that it is working in this case.
The governor said he doesn’t know if the number of signatures gathered will translate over to broad support for the referendum if it makes it on the ballot in 2026.