Woods Cross Republican Sen. Todd Weiler is sponsoring a bill this year that, if passed, would specify in the state code that come May 6, “there is no right of action for alienation of affections.”

Turning the bill into law would place Utah in line with the majority of states that have prohibited it as a cause of action for lawsuits, Weiler said. It would also do away with a “patently offensive concept.”

“This legal claim stems from this medieval concept that a wife is the chattel of her husband, and if somebody else is getting favors or taking advantage, that they owe some type of money to the husband because they’ve used his property,” Weiler said in an interview Friday.

Utah radio personalities and even the Utah Division of Wildlife have been part of these types of lawsuits, according to a 2004 report from the Deseret News. A former member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for example, sued church leaders for $10 million arguing they influenced his divorce after convincing his ex-wife she couldn’t achieve salvation if she remained married to him. That lawsuit was dismissed.

Last year a North Carolina case made national headlines when a TikTok influencer was ordered to pay $1.75 million after a jury found her liable for having an affair with her manager, according to CNN.

Weiler said that case didn’t influence his decision to run the bill. But, other cases of “vengeful” litigation and threats have, especially since the cause of action has been used to up the ante and make divorce settlements harder, he said.

“It also, I think, disrespects the free will of parties who have decided to move on to a different relationship,” Weiler said. “And so, because it’s mostly just weaponized these days, and that’s why it’s been, I think, banned in other states, we’re just just taking that off the table.”

Weiler is also sponsoring a bill that would strike Utah from the short list of states that allow common-law marriages, or marriages that are legally recognized between two people without a marriage license or a solemnized wedding.

If the Legislature votes to approve his proposal, “a marriage that is not properly solemnized (will become) invalid unless a court or administrative order legally recognized the marriage before May 6, 2026.”

This is more of a cleanup bill, Weiler said, and wouldn’t have an impact on how couples choose to have their wedding officiated.

Utah has been moving away from common-law marriage for a while, Weiler said. The state currently allows the “recognition of an unsolemnized marriage.” So, couples who have lived together longer than they have been married can sometimes claim the marriage started with their cohabitation.

“It just complicates, and I think, bogs down litigation. And the uncertainty of it all makes it harder to settle a case,” Weiler said. “And we don’t want to make cases hard to settle, because then, if every case goes to trial, then we have more backlog, and we have to build more courthouses and hire more judges.”