A panel of Utah lawmakers have given an initial nod to a draft bill that would criminalize accessing and disclosing certain information about how or when individual voters return their ballots.
The Government Operations Interim Committee voted unanimously on Wednesday to endorse the first iteration of the legislation, sponsored by Rep. Stephanie Gricius, R-Eagle Mountain. The vote tees the bill up for prioritized consideration when the Legislature convenes in its 2025 general session on Jan. 25.
The legislation comes as some elected officials — including Sen. Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, who was recently elected to the Senate’s new Republican leadership team as majority assistant whip — have expressed concerns about Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson tracking information on how at least two politicians returned their ballots.
What would the bill do?
Gricius’ bill, as currently drafted, would make it “unlawful for a person to access an election record to determine whether a specific voter” or a small, identifiable group of voters “voted in person or otherwise,” the method they used to return their ballot, or the date they voted or returned their ballot.
Under the bill, an election official who already has lawful access to such election records may only access or disclose the information “to the extent necessary to fulfill a duty” within their capacity as an election official, to comply with a court order, or if the specific voter requests in writing that the election official access the information.
“What this bill essentially says is you cannot do a looky-loo at someone’s information for fun,” Gricius said. “If you don’t have a specific election-related purpose, then you can’t just look up specific individuals.”
A violation of the bill would be a class B misdemeanor. If the Legislature approves it, it would take effect on May 7.
Where is this coming from?
Gricius did not specifically name Davidson when she explained the legislation in the interim committee meeting Wednesday, but she alluded to him.
“This came as the result of a county clerk releasing information to the media about specific individuals and the way that they cast their ballots,” Gricius said, adding that some of the voter records disclosed were not classified as private, but some were.
Last month, Davidson told the Deseret News he tracks how politicians cast their ballots. He specifically named McKell — who has criticized Davidson for discouraging voters from putting their ballots in the mail — and called McKell out for not putting a stamp on his ballot envelope in the primary.
McKell said he first learned of the issue when a Deseret News reporter contacted him, and that alarmed him because he said he has opted to classify his voter records as private. McKell said he believes Davidson violated state law for revealing information about his voter status. The Utah County Attorney’s Office has said it’s investigating those claims.
Giricus was also apparently on Davidson’s list, which she decried to FOX 13 as “inappropriate” because she said he was using his position as clerk to “look up specific ballots with the purpose of collecting information on those individuals to be used against them in the political arena.”
In an interview with Utah News Dispatch on Wednesday, Davidson said he told Gricius in a “personal conversation, because I felt that she was sincere about election integrity,” that he noticed she mailed her ballot.
“I said to her, ‘Stephanie, you used the U.S. Postal Service also, and I just want you to know that I really do believe that returning it through our drop boxes and mail is more secure. I just would encourage you to use those methods,’” Davidson said, adding that “she’s the one that publicly announced we had a personal conversation about it.”
In response to Gricius’ bill, Davidson dismissed it as her “doing the bidding of Michael McKell,” and he attributed it to a feud between himself and the senator. The two have clashed over Davidson’s earlier decision that Utah County would no longer automatically pay return postage for by-mail ballots, and Davidson instead encouraged voters to pay the $0.73 for their stamps. If they didn’t, the U.S. Postal Service would still deliver the ballot, but charge the county.
“That data point of how somebody returns their ballot is not designated as a private record, and Mike McKell is butthurt that I revealed it, and so now since he has the power to make something designated illegal, he decided that he wanted to make it illegal because he was too cheap to put a stamp on it,” Davidson said.
McKell, however, told Utah News Dispatch that Gricius opened the bill file on her own after she learned Davidson was tracking certain elected officials’ voting methods.
“I wasn’t even aware she opened the bill file,” McKell said, adding that Davidson’s claims that she’s doing his “bidding” is “complete nonsense.”
“Aaron needs to focus on running elections instead of looking up private records of elected officials,” McKell said. “It was an incredibly problematic way he ran that election.”
Davidson has argued he hasn’t done anything wrong, and that the information Gricius’ bill would restrict is already publicly available on the existing “Who Has Voted” report that the state offers on a paid subscription basis for voter information that’s not classified as private.
While the “Who Has Voted” report includes bulk voter information — including names, party affiliation, method of voting (like whether they voted early or by mail), and the date the voter returned the ballot — it doesn’t include information voters have chosen to classify as private. It also doesn’t include whether a voter’s ballot envelope had a stamp on it or not.
Because Davidson knew which envelope McKell’s ballot came in and whether it had paid postage, that suggests his efforts to track politicians’ voting methods is “very different” than the “Who Has Voted” report, McKell said, “and it took a lot of effort on his part.”
“I specifically, affirmatively made the choice to have my ballot be private,” McKell said. “And disclosing that I voted at all is a violation of that statute, and that’s why he’s being investigated.”
Asked why Gricius’ bill is necessary, McKell said lawmakers are considering it to add “clarity to the constitutional right” to a secret ballot with “statutory protections.”
Gricius, during Wednesday’s committee meeting, acknowledged that as the bill progresses through the legislative session, it may need to be “tweaked” to ensure the legislation doesn’t restrict the existing “Who Has Voted” report. But, she said she’s “committed to working through that as we keep it going through the process.”
Ultimately what her bill is focused on, though, is actions to target and disclose information about individuals or a small group of individuals and for accessing that information without a professional reason.
“Basically, if you do not have an official purpose for searching a specific individual,” Gricius said, “You should not be doing it.”
Committee debate
The committee’s chair, Sen. Daniel Thatcher, R-West Valley City, spoke in favor of the bill, saying “elections and voting are kind of a big deal to me. I would argue that without getting our elections right, nothing else we do matters.”
“The idea that a county clerk could (disclose information) — whether for a noble crusading idea or whether out of malice or spite — is irrelevant,” Thatcher said. “The idea that someone could access that protected, sacred right to vote and weaponize it against opponents or enemies, real or perceived, is unthinkable.”
Marilyn Momeny, of American Fork, also spoke in favor of the bill, saying she worked in elections part time in 2022 and 2023, and she had access to voter databases. She said it’s “concerning” that an election official would target individuals’ voting methods and disclose that information.
“It is definitely a violation,” Momeny said. “It didn’t even occur to me to look people up and see whether they mailed in their ballot or voted in a voting center. One would hope all election workers and anyone who has the data has that kind of discretion, but obviously some people have different judgements about what they should keep private and what they shouldn’t.”
Davidson said he has been busy finalizing the county’s election results this week, otherwise he would have attended Wednesday’s committee meeting. His comments to Utah News Dispatch, however, were mainly focused on criticizing McKell and other elected officials who have been critical of him. He also fixated on defending his stance against voting by mail and the money he said it saved Utah County taxpayers.
Davidson said this election year, about 76% of Utah County voters returned their ballots through ballot drop boxes, which he said resulted in nearly $45,000 in savings to taxpayers. Of those who did mail their ballots, he said almost 79% of them put a stamp on their envelope, saving the county nearly $29,000.
“Changing to not paying for return postage saved Utah County taxpayers about $73,000 this election cycle,” he said. “Those that didn’t put the stamp on cost the Utah County taxpayers $6,600. I allocate a large majority of that to Mike McKell.”
Utah County’s total 2024 budget includes over $133 million in revenue, according to the county auditor.
McKell said he’s not focused on Davidson or “this side show,” which he said “takes away from the fact we need to run elections fairly and that voters have a right to a secret ballot.”
“That’s my focus,” he said. “My focus isn’t Aaron Davidson. My focus is we run elections efficiently and we have that privacy that’s guaranteed by the constitution.”
Utah News Dispatch is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.