The Utah GOP’s state delegates have charted the next chapter for the state’s dominant political party — sticking with an incumbent who characterized himself as a “bridge builder” rather than a burner.

With nearly 64% turnout during their organizing convention at Utah Valley University in Orem on Saturday, 2,555 Utah Republican Party state delegates voted to reelect Rob Axson as their party chair, handing another loss to his challenger and unsuccessful gubernatorial candidate Phil Lyman.

Axson won with about 52.4% (1,340 votes), to Lyman’s 47.5% (1,215 votes), according to the party’s election results.

The vote settled what many delegates considered a toss-up contest — but Axson won with a healthy majority. Though Lyman and his “Make Utah Great Again” campaign was given a warm reception with loud cheers from passionate supporters, Axson was a formidable incumbent, buoyed by an endorsement from President Donald Trump about a week before the convention.

To Axson, his victory showed delegates “want to see more” of what he’s started in the Utah Republican Party.

“They want to see additional momentum. They want to see growth,” Axson told reporters after his win. “They’ve seen what I’ve delivered over the last two years … and that is now the new foundation. Let’s build from there.”

Axson vs. Lyman

Axson — who championed his fundraising record as chair of the party since 2023 and framed himself as a “bridge builder” rather than a burner — was also endorsed by other Utah Republican Party heavyweights, including Sen. Mike Lee and other Utahns in Congress, as well as high-ranking state leaders including House Speaker Mike Schultz, and former party chair Carson Jorgensen.

Lyman, on the other hand, campaigned against the “establishment,” continuing a barrage of unsubstantiated claims that he peddled during his unsuccessful bid last year against Gov. Spencer Cox that there’s “corruption” and election fraud in Utah government.

In the end, though, delegates signaled they liked the track Axson has put the party on over the last two years, while they rejected Lyman’s pitch for a more combative — perhaps even unlawful — future GOP.

While challenging Axson for party chair, Lyman painted himself as a leader who would position the Utah GOP to more aggressively assert its capability to select Republican nominees rather than follow SB54, a 2014 state law that allows a dual path to the primary through both the caucus and convention process and through signature gathering.

Though Axson also agreed Utah Republicans should continue fighting SB54, he disagreed with taking Lyman’s approach, which Axson argued would amount to breaking the law. Instead, Axson said the party should focus on working with the Utah Legislature to change the law.

During his speech, Axson told delegates that SB54 “still undermines the principles of our party.” However, he also said “the law is the law, and claiming otherwise is not a strategy for success, no matter how loudly you do so.”

“We must repeal SB54, but we cannot unless we are united,” he said. “We can’t beat SB54 if we spend all our time beating one another.”

Without naming Lyman during his speech, Axson said there’s a “clear difference between me and others: I am not willing to break the law, especially to break the law in a way that will jeopardize our Republican candidates and force them to get signatures instead of leaning into the delegate process that we all believe in.”

Axson also touted the endorsement from Trump, along with support from members of Utah’s congressional delegation and others.

“Ultimately if we want to be successful beyond the next 20 years, if we hope to bring the next generation into the Republican Party, we must build,” he said.

Lyman, during his speech, didn’t specifically address SB54 or specifics about his vision as party leader, but he focused on his philosophical stance for a government that “belongs to the people.”

“I wish that I lived in 1765 back in Boston,” Lyman said, adding that if he did, “I would have been a member of the Sons of Liberty,” referring to a secretive and sometimes violent political organization in the 13 American Colonies that worked to fight taxation by the British government.

“I would have been there in 1770 when the Boston Massacre occurred, I would have been there in 1773 when the (Boston) Tea Party took place,” Lyman said. “Because those people were pushing back against the government that did not have their interests at heart. That’s what we’re about.”

Lyman said the Sons of Liberty were “called all kinds of horrible names too, including bridge burners, but they actually burned bridges to impede the direction of their enemy.”

Lyman also issued a call to action to unite Utah Republicans, regardless of the outcome of the race for GOP chair.

“From this point, we will be united,” he said. “I will stand behind Rob Axson. He’s a friend of mine. I love Donald Trump, he’s my president. I’ve supported him. I appreciate Sen. Lee. … I recognize their efforts, I support them.”

But Lyman concluded his speech by telling delegates “this is a time for you.”

“This is your party. The Republican Party is yours. And today you will decide what direction this party takes,” he said, to loud cheers.

Continued angst with SB54

On full display throughout the convention was Republican delegates’ continued hatred of SB54.  Utah lawmakers passed the law more than 10 years ago as a compromise to ward off a looming ballot initiative to do away with the caucus and convention system altogether in favor of signature gathering.

But ever since, Utah Republican Party caucus system loyalists have despised the law, even though it’s survived multiple court challenges that almost drove the Utah GOP to bankruptcy. It’s become one of the largest wedges dividing Utah Republicans, and Republicans’ strategy to continue fighting it was at the heart of the contest between Axson and Lyman.

But if there was an early indication that most delegates weren’t in favor of taking a scorched earth approach to challenge SB54 further, one of the first votes they took Saturday morning was to strip from the agenda a proposed amendment to the party’s constitution that would temporarily revoke a Republican candidate’s party membership if they gain access to the ballot through signature gathering rather than through the caucus and convention system.

State law specifies two types of political parties: registered parties and qualified political parties. Candidates of registered parties must use signature gathering to access the ballot, while candidates of qualified parties (a designation the Utah GOP currently functions under), can either gather signatures or be nominated at convention. Utah law does not have a designation that lets parties only allow ballot access through nomination.

If the state GOP’s proposed amendment to strip a candidate’s party membership for using a legal pathway to the ballot had passed, it would have violated state law and possibly could have led to yet another court challenge.

The amendment’s sponsor, Arnold Gaunt, motioned to remove it from the agenda, saying “there’s a better path for responding to the problem.”

Axson told reporters that he’s “not a fan” of SB54 and the signature gathering path, but he  focused his message on “not lawsuits, not division, not purity tests. It’s building something that can’t be ignored.”

“If we build an apparatus that every Utahn and every community feels that there’s a value in that, well they’re going to come along with us,” Axson said. “They’re going to be supportive of what we’re trying to do, and the Legislature is going to listen to that.”

Axson said his preference would be for the Legislature to repeal SB54. Pressed on whether that’s a real possibility, he told reporters “the votes are there in the House” while they’re “not there yet in the Senate.”

“But it can’t be a vitriolic conversation. It’s not threats. It has to be a conversation that’s transparent and up front and collaborative,” Axson said. “If we can show the value of what the Republican Party is doing … and trying to grow and build additional capacity, we make it a lot easier on these elected officials to take the hard votes of repealing SB54.”

However, Axson acknowledged “it’s going to take some time.”

“How long or how short that is, I don’t know,” Axson said. “But I do know we have in our ability the opportunity to build a strong party, and that will be a benefit in repealing SB54 or solving other complex issues.”

Axson’s influential supporters

The morning of the convention, Axson’s predecessor, former Utah GOP Chair Carson Jorgensen, was chatting up delegates wearing an Axson button on his shirt. He said Axson is the right leader for the party, lauding him as a proven organizer and fundraiser who helped bring the party out of bankruptcy after multiple failed legal challenges of SB54.

Jorgensen said Axson will take the right approach by focusing on working with lawmakers to strengthen the caucus-convention system rather than more lawsuits.

“I like Phil personally as a friend, I think he’s a nice guy,” Jorgensen said. “But here’s the thing. There are three ways we’re going to navigate SB54, and only three. One is the lawsuit route. We’ve tried it. It doesn’t work. Phil is 0 for 5 on lawsuits. The party can’t afford another lawsuit.”

Jorgensen said the next option is a “legislative fix,” which requires a “relationship with the Legislature.”

“Sorry, but Phil has burned every — every — bridge he had with any legislator,” Jorgensen said.

The last option, he said, is the party opts to hold its own primary.

“What does that take? Money,” Jorgensen said. “If the party’s going to hold their own primary, they’ve got to fund it. We figure between $1.5 and $3 million to run it. Rob has shown he can raise that kind of money.”

So Axson has “two of the three that need to happen, and Phil doesn’t have any,” Jorgensen concluded. “That’s why I support Rob.”

Jorgensen also issued a call to Utah Republicans to set their differences aside and coalesce behind the new chair.

“Everybody needs to get back on the same page. This has been a pretty toxic election,” he said, adding that someone recently called him an “establishment RHINO hack.” To that, he said, “you obviously don’t know me and you’re on the wrong side of things, because you don’t find anybody more conservative than I am.”

Another Axson supporter seen mingling with delegates was House Speaker Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, who was also acting as a delegate Saturday. He told Utah News Dispatch that he’d be voting for Axson for party chair “because we need somebody to bring all sides together.”

“That’s what we do in the Legislature,” Schultz said. “We have to work to find common ground.”

Why not Lyman? Schultz declined to comment, focusing his remarks instead on his support of Axson. Trump’s endorsement of Axson, Schultz said, indicates Trump “has noticed something different about Utah.”

“He has embraced Utah and sees Utah as being able to help push the agenda that he’s pushing on a nationwide level,” Schultz said. “I think that’s why you saw President Trump chime in and say, what you’re doing in Utah is working, stick with it.”

Schultz added that Utah Republicans need to realize “if we split up our party, we lose.”

“If the party gets split, it’s the best thing that can happen for Democrats in the state of Utah,” he said. “So finding ways to keep the party together keeps Utah Republican, it keeps Utah conservative. That’s what President Trump sees and that’s why I’m supporting Rob Axson.”

How will Utah lawmakers tackle SB54?

Pressed on efforts to repeal SB54, Schultz told Utah News Dispatch he and lawmakers are open to working with the Utah Republican Party to find a path forward that’s focused on strengthening the caucus and convention system — but he also warned that completely undoing SB54 could have negative consequences.

“Count My Vote has been very open and saying that they will run a ballot initiative that does away with the caucus convention altogether,” he said. “I think that would be very harmful to the grassroots of our party.”

Schultz added: “I love the caucus convention system because it does keep money out of politics. So I would like to look for ways to make the caucus and convention system stronger and get their people involved in the caucus and convention system.”

“That is a good pathway forward,” he said, but he didn’t offer any specifics of what that could look like in legislative action.

“I truly don’t know,” he said, “but I think we need to understand the consequences of (undoing SB54). We look at the polling, and it’s not even close. If it goes to ballot initiative, we lose the caucus and convention system. And I think that would be horrible. I would rather find ways to make the caucus and convention system stronger.”

The ‘MUGA’ message that resonated with many, but failed

Wearing a maroon MUGA hat in support of Lyman, Tiffany Mendenhall, of Ivins, said she was all in favor of Lyman for chair.

“Lyman has our best interest at heart,” she said, adding that she didn’t like the outcome of the governor’s race last year and the direction the Utah GOP has been heading. “Phil is very well aware of what’s going on with all the crookedness and all of that stuff. He intends to get us back to more traditional voting methods so that there’s no fraud.”

Though Utah’s election was certified and Cox legally qualified as a Republican candidate before he went on to win the election, Mendenhall said she believed the governor’s race was “absolutely stolen,” arguing he “didn’t have the signatures.”

While signature gathering audits did find “some errors” and that based on statistical error rates Cox could have initially fallen short of the 28,000-signature requirement, auditors also reported that had clerks told him he hadn’t qualified (which they didn’t), he would have had 28 days more days to submit enough signatures. Ultimately, the audits concluded Cox followed the law and qualified for the primary.

Mendenhall, however, stood firm on the false claim that Lyman has repeatedly pushed throughout both his gubernatorial and Utah GOP chair campaigns — that Cox was an illegitimate candidate and “stole” the election.

“You can’t tell us that it wasn’t. And so how can we feel that we have a fair election when our governor in charge is a cheat?” Mendenhall said. She argued Axson hasn’t done enough to challenge what happened during the governor’s race. “He hasn’t stood up to take care of this. This shouldn’t have happened.”

Utah News Dispatch is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.