Legislator proposes presidential preference poll

A leading Utah legislator says that the state can't afford to put on a presidential primary election a year from now, so he's introduced legislation that would require political parties to conduct a "presidential preference poll."

Rep. Doug Aagard, R-Kaysville, who has run a number of election bills over the years, says that the $850,000 that the Legislature put aside last year for the 2008 presidential primary "doesn't come close" to paying for such a broad, statewide election in the new day of electronic voting machines.

"I think it would cost $1.5 million more, above the $850,000. And we just don't have it" in the budget subcommittee out of which election costs come, he said.

Aagard's HB392 says that each officially registered political party would get a small amount of cash as a start-up payment and then would submit actual election expenses for reimbursement.

Court rulings have limited the state's authority over the actions of political parties, like how parties nominate their candidates.

"So I don't know how much we can tell them to do" in each party setting rules for the presidential poll, Aagard said.

Utah's participation in presidential primaries is mixed.

Before the 2000 presidential election, then-Gov. Mike Leavitt traveled to Mountain West states trying to get them to join in a regional primary. Leavitt hoped that presidential candidates, especially Republican candidates, would come to the region, campaign and learn about regional issues.

The Legislature allocated $600,000 for that primary. But the vote was ill-timed, and just before the Utah vote (only two other states joined with Utah), many GOP candidates dropped out, leaving then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush the Republican nominee.

Only around 10 percent of Utah voters went to the polls.

In 2004, Republicans knew who their nominee would be: sitting President Bush.

Not wanting to spend any money on just a Democratic primary, the GOP-controlled Utah Legislature provided no funds for a 2004 presidential primary.

The Utah Democratic Party held its own primary, spending tens of thousands of dollars. But, again, it was poorly timed, and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., had the nomination about locked up when the vote was held.

With an open presidential field in 2008, GOP Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and the Utah Legislature a year ago put $850,000 aside for a state/county run presidential primary in early 2008.

But now Aagard says that amount is not nearly enough to run a statewide primary election. And so local political parties will be asked to step up and organize the voting.

"We do want it early enough that our vote would have some impact" on the presidential primaries, he said. Otherwise, it could just be a repeat of 2000, when Utah's vote ended up not making any impact on the race, and few candidates bothered to campaign here.

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