Utah’s GOP-controlled legislature is once again elevating fringe conspiracy fodder into state policy, peddling the paranoid “Great Reset” myth under a “state sovereignty” label.
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HB85 from Rep. Lisa Shepherd, R-Provo, targets an imaginary threat: international organizations overriding Utah’s sovereignty. The bill bars the governor or other officials from declaring a state of emergency “exclusively in response” to an emergency declaration from entities like the United Nations or World Health Organization and from enforcing directives issued by those groups. It also says that international organizations do not have any jurisdiction in Utah. The bill is essentially a rehash of last year’s HB158, which failed.
HB85 singles out the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, and the World Health Organization, which is no accident. They’re the favorite villains in far-right conspiracy circles, especially the COVID-era “Great Reset” fantasy—where “global elites” allegedly manufacture crises to install a one-world police state and enslave humanity.
Shepherd’s bill is a solution searching for a problem. Even Shepherd admits these organizations don’t have jurisdiction in Utah and that the scenario her bill imagines has never happened.
“We haven’t really had something like this happen. However, some people feel like perhaps it did happen in 2020,” Shepherd said during a committee hearing on her bill. “There are times that political manipulation might happen and that they’ll put this force on us and that’s what we’re trying to avoid.”
Asked in committee why the bill singles out those three organizations, Shepherd first claimed the language already existed in Utah code. A member noted it was new; she then blamed staff.
“I’m going to have to actually see on that one because my understanding is that did come from somewhere,” Shepherd said. “I thought that came from another place in the documents, but that was my understanding.”
That dodge strains credulity. Last year’s HB158 targeted the same three organizations.
Sen. Ron Winterton, R-Roosevelt, the Senate sponsor of HB85,has his own record with conspiracy-inspired legislation. Last year, he pushed a “chemtrails” bill—rooted in the debunked claim that airplanes secretly spray toxic chemicals to manipulate the weather. It failed, and he’s brought it back this session.
Shepherd’s bill has already cleared the House. It’s set for a hearing in the Senate Government Operations and Political Subdivisions Committee on Wednesday afternoon.