SALT LAKE CITY — The state Senate has confirmed two justices for an expanded Utah Supreme Court.
In a vote of 24-5, senators voted to confirm Stephen Dent to the state's top court. He previously worked as an assistant U.S. Attorney for Utah, based in St. George. Sen. Stephanie Pitcher, D-Salt Lake City, was the lone Democrat to support his confirmation.
The Senate then voted 22-7 to confirm Jay Jorgensen, who recently worked as an attorney for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, to the Utah Supreme Court. Sen. Emily Buss, FWD-Eagle Mountain, voted with Democrats against his nomination.
Senators vigorously debated Dent and Jorgensen's qualifications. Sen. Jen Plumb, D-Salt Lake City, questioned why Dent would be confirmed if he has never served as a judge before. A physician in her day job, she likened it to performing an appendectomy without having done surgery before. Sen. Brady Brammer, R-Highland, pushed back, telling his colleagues "these are not people that have not been engaged thoroughly in the legal work of the day."
But Sen. Kathleen Riebe, D-Cottonwood Heights, disagreed with the expansion of the Utah Supreme Court, which came after Republicans on Utah's Capitol Hill were angered by rulings the Court has made on hot topics like abortion rights and the power of citizens to alter and reform their government.
"What it doesn’t bring is that confidence back from the people of Utah who see us jeopardizing our judicial branch and its independency," she said.
Jorgensen also faced criticism over whether he met the legal requirements to be a justice on the Utah Supreme Court. He has worked in Washington D.C., Arkansas, South Korea and served a mission to Chile. Questions were raised in his confirmation hearing about whether he'd been in Utah five years as required. Sen. Pitcher warned of a possible legal challenge to his residency qualification.
After his confirmation, Jorgensen pushed back by reading from the state constitution taking note of phrases like "next preceding" and "preceding."
"Supreme Court justices shall be at least 30 years old, United States citizens, Utah residents for five years, preceding selection," he said. "Not next preceding, preceding. So that was the comment I made and wished to have understood in the commission. Who decides? You decide."
Both justices have characterized themselves as "originalists" and "textualists" in judicial philosophy, meaning they take a strict adherence to the original meaning of the law.
They will assume the bench with an almost brand-new Supreme Court with Governor Spencer Cox having appointed five of the seven justices. The Utah State Legislature passed a bill expanding the Court to seven members. Justice Diana Hagen resigned as Republican leaders on Capitol Hill demanded an investigation into allegations of misconduct (which she denied); Chief Justice Matthew Durrant has announced his resignation citing health problems; and Utah Republican Party have been pushing voters to not retain Associate Chief Justice Jill Pohlman in the next election angry over rulings on citizen initiatives and independent redistricting.
The group Co-Equal Utah, formed to defend the judiciary from partisan attacks, said it wished Justices Dent and Jorgensen well.
"Co-Equal Utah does not take a position on specific retention elections. But we do note that the organized effort to oust Justice Pohlman, combined with the wholesale remaking of this court, represents exactly the kind of political pressure on the judiciary that our organization was formed to oppose," it said in a statement to FOX 13 News.
"We call on Justices Jorgensen and Dent to honor the commitments they made during their confirmation hearings: to apply the law as written, to rule without regard to political outcomes, and to uphold precedent, including the unanimous decisions this court has already issued on redistricting and the citizens' right of initiative. Utah's courts can still function as a necessary and genuine check on government overreach. Whether this reconstituted court will do so remains to be seen."
