Challenger Claudia Wright expects to take Rep. Jim Matheson to a primary

SALT LAKE CITY — Claudia Wright thinks she'll see her name on a 2nd Congressional District primary ballot in June and may even win enough delegate votes in the state Democratic convention this week to eliminate five-term U.S. Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah.

"I think my chances" of getting 40 percent of the delegate vote in the convention — and thus making it to the June 22 primary — "are excellent," Wright said in an interview.

"There's an outside chance I could get 60 percent" and win the 2nd District Democratic nomination outright at Saturday's convention, she said. (She needs 360 delegate votes to get 40 percent, 540 votes to get 60 percent.)

Matheson won't rule out a primary fight. But he says flatly that Wright won't get 60 percent of the Democratic delegate vote — he won't be eliminated in the convention.

Matheson has never faced a convention challenge. He's never been in a primary.

"I'm confident I will be the (Democratic) nominee, and that I will win in November," he said in a telephone interview from Washington, D.C.

Whatever the convention outcome, it's clear that Matheson, 50, is feeling unprecedented opposition among his own party's loyalists.

Wright says there are a lot of new Democratic delegates this year.

She said as Utah's Republican Party moves even further to the right, independents who used to vote Republican, and even moderate Republicans, are becoming involved in Democratic politics.

"There are a lot of new Democrats out there who used to have R's behind their names," she said.

Wright, 61, is a retired school teacher of 31 years who still teaches a few college-level courses on women's issues and gender studies.

She describes herself as a "lesbian, open about it" who lives with her partner on Salt Lake County's east side.

"I was born and raised in the county, went to Olympus High School," she said.

Matheson said Wright's sexual orientation is not an issue in the intra-party race. "No delegate has brought it up," he said. The Deseret News is the first to ask about it, he added.