Utah County Clerk says Utah Lt. Governor should be punished for “election fraud”

PROVO, Utah  —  The man responsible for overseeing elections in Utah’s second-largest county, is calling for Lt. Governor Deidre Henderson to be punished for what he said is election fraud.

In a letter circulating social media right now, Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson thanked readers “for taking the time to ‘seek’ truth” about the 2024 election cycle.

“An insider’s perspective on how the primary election between Cox and Lyman went very wrong—by Aaron Davidson, Utah County Clerk https://t.co/GIashGnW9v pic.twitter.com/CtBSwtea8M

— Phil Lyman for Governor (@phil_lyman) October 24, 2024

 

Davidson claims the lieutenant governor acted inappropriately when it came to the verification of signatures required for Gov. Cox to get on the ballot during the gubernatorial primary in Utah earlier this year.

In the letter he says the lieutenant governor should be punished for this. He says that would assure the public that Utah takes election security seriously.

“They used the word punished,” Davidson told KSL NewsRadio. “That could come in a variety of different ways. That could be a reprimand, that could be a verbal — something from the legislature saying ‘you did some things wrong.'”

Utah has 29 counties, Davidson is the only county clerk among his colleagues who has raised this issue.

“I think she had the opportunity to be more open, and more transparent,” Davidson said.

How Henderson handled signature verification ahead of the primary

Leading up to the primaries, Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson assigned Davis County to verify the signatures for the gubernatorial race. She did this because she was on the ballot.

Davidson claims the state and Davis County should have signed a contract before the signatures were verified.

KSL NewsRadio has learned that the decision to hand off signature verification is at the discretion of the lieutenant governor.

“If she decided to do that with Davis County,” said Utah Commissioner Amelia Powers Gardner, “then no contract is necessary.

Despite the code Davidson references, there is no legal footing for a required contract between the state and a county assigned to verify signatures.

“The only thing that the contract is for is the money needed to exchange hands to compensate Davis County for the work that they did do,” Powers Gardner said.

However, an exception exists cases involving money.

Davidson stated in his letter that he wants the individual clerks to verify the signatures that come from their county rather than one clerk verifying all of them. 

Reactions to Davidson’s letter

At the time of publication, the lieutenant governor’s office had declined to comment. But Davis County Clerk Brian McKenzie has responded to the letter, stating he was “disappointed and frustrated with [Davidson’s] false statements and accusations” against the lieutenant governor. 

Write-in candidate for governor Phil Lyman posted Davidson’s letter on his X account. He later asked his followers what the consequences should be for defrauding an election.

What should be the consequences/penalties for knowingly defrauding an election?

— Phil Lyman for Governor (@phil_lyman) October 27, 2024

 

That’s when reactions turned violent, with some responders asking for the death penalty and posting pictures of nooses.

Former FBI agent Greg Rogers said they take these threats very seriously.

“We’re going to, you know, expend a whole lot of time and energy to really see if anybody is going to act on these threats or if it’s just – they’re just venting,” Rogers said.

He said that people believe they have a right to act in dangerous ways when they think officials are mishandling elections.

Davidson emphasized that he doesn’t condone the calls for violence towards the lieutenant governor.

” He [Lyman] has the right to post his feelings and people have the right to post what they feel. I don’t agree with what some of the people said.

“There’s people out there who just say stupid things.”

‘He should recuse himself’

Meanwhile, former Utah County Clerk and current Utah County Commissioner Amelia Powers Gardner said Aaron Davidson should recuse himself right now.

“I think he’s using his office to further his political ideology rather than administering the elections and serving the people he was elected to serve in an unbiased manner,” she told KSL NewsRadio.

Powers Gardner said she has never seen anything like this before. It’s not unprecedented for clerks to recuse themselves, she said.

Including elections when the clerk is on the ballot for re-election and can’t be nonpartisan.

Simone Seikaly contributed.