The Utah Republican Party’s new one-year party purity rule just knocked a congressional candidate out of the race—even as Salt Lake County Republicans decided the same rule doesn’t apply to them.
In March, party officials told retired Air Force Maj. Gen. David Harris, a 3rd Congressional District candidate, that he was ineligible for the Utah GOP convention because he hadn’t been registered as a Republican for a full year—the new threshold the party set to keep last-minute switchers off the ballot.
11 days - Utah State Republican and Democratic State Party nominating conventions (4/25/2026)
70 days - Utah's 2026 primary election (6/23/2026)
203 days - 2026 midterm elections (11/3/2026)
938 days - 2028 presidential election (11/7/2028)
Harris said in a statement that he changed his affiliation to unaffiliated while in senior Air Force leadership to avoid any appearance of partisanship in uniform and re-registered as a Republican when he launched his campaign this year.
With the convention door closed, his only path was the signature route. On Friday, he ended his campaign, saying he wouldn’t be able to collect the required 7,000 signatures to secure a spot on the primary ballot.
“While I was honored by the opportunity to run, we were ultimately unable to gather the required signatures due to time and financial constraints,” Harris said. “I am deeply grateful to everyone who supported this effort… Although this campaign is coming to an end, my commitment to this community and the values we share does not.”
The one-year rule was crafted to deter last-minute party switchers. The state central committee adopted it after former Rep. Kera Birkeland abruptly resigned in December 2024 and Kris Campbell—the Democrat she’d just defeated—switched to Republican to run in the special election. Delegates later wrote the rule into the party constitution at the state convention.
That same purity test almost derailed a few Republican candidates in Salt Lake County—until county leaders decided it didn’t apply to them.
State School Board candidate Trina Christensen was initially told she couldn’t seek the nomination at the county convention because she hadn’t been registered Republican for a full year before filing. That would have ended her campaign because she wasn’t collecting signatures.
After reconsidering, the county party said the rule doesn’t bind them because of a one-word discrepancy between the bylaws and the state constitution. The bylaws say the one-year requirement applies to anyone running as a Republican, while the constitution says it applies to anyone seeking to run as a “state” Republican candidate. County officials say that lone word limits the rule to statewide and legislative races, not county contests.
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