April 29, 2018

"It's now time for the public to step up, and pay attention. We have got primary elections coming up in the fourth Tuesday in June, general elections in November, and it's an obligation that we have as voters to pay attention to the issues, the candidates, to ask questions to determine what their positions are..." Governor Herbert

NARRATOR: KUED presents the Governor's Monthly News Conference, an exchange between Utah reporters and Governor Gary Herbert.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Good morning everyone.

REPORTERS: Good morning Governor.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Thank you for coming. Let me begin today by first expressing my condolences to the Sam Granato family and friends on his passing yesterday, I know he's battled cancer for a couple of years. I first met Sam actually back in 2004-2005 when I became Lieutenant Governor, and considered him a good friend, he was a friend to everybody, and I appreciate the fact that Sam was a good businessman in the private sector, and a great public servant in the public sector. Served in many different capacities over his time here, and really trying to make life better for those that he represented, and whether you’re eating at his deli, or whether your sitting and listening to him pontificate on some public issues, he was a good man and he will be very much missed, so we offer our condolences.

That being said, let me talk about this time of year. As some of you have noticed, it's been in all the papers, we have elections, and we have people out there caucusing, and conventioneering and trying to become the nominee of their party. Republicans last Saturday, Democrats this Saturday, and others out there are trying to get the nomination of their party. It's a wonderful process we have here in Utah, I appreciate the fact that people will step up and actually say choose me, and that's not necessarily easy to do, having done it a few times myself, it takes a little bit of courage, and a little bit of desire to serve your fellow man, and so I appreciate and applaud those who have done that. 

It's now time for the public to step up, and pay attention. We have got primary elections coming up in the fourth Tuesday in June, general elections in November, and it's an obligation that we have as voters to pay attention to the issues, the candidates, to ask questions to determine what their positions are and if they represent what we think should be taking place in whether it's in the local government arena, or the state legislature, or back in Washington, D.C. It's disappointing I think to all of us, the fact that we have such a successful state, in virtually every measurable way we're very positive. 

Except when it comes to participation of our voters, we don't have a large voter turnout, we need to change that. Everybody should pay attention, and really circle the calendar and say I will vote. We've made it much easier with vote by mail, there's really no excuse for people not to participate, not to understand the issues, and the candidates, and to vote and participate in the election process, so my plea to everybody now as we're going through and kind of having heightened awareness right now to pay attention and do your responsible duty as a taxpayer, as a citizen of this great state, to vote.

With that, I'm happy to take any questions you might have today.

ERIK NEILSEN, KUED: So, Governor, the state-wide GOP convention, like you mentioned, was held last weekend, it went for many hours, so I have a couple questions, first of all, were you there the whole time? And second, I'm wondering if, with all the bickering that was going on, and how the results of the senate race forcing a primary in the 3rd District forcing a primary do you think that's a referendum for or against the Count My Vote initiative?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Boy, you've got a lot in there. I was there for four hours, participating, I'm not a delegate but I was there, and I had the opportunity to meet with many delegates, and talk about issues pertaining to the state. I enjoyed that opportunity, I think it's fun, and enjoyable to talk and have some discussion and dialogue about the issues of the state.

My wife on the other hand, was a delegate, and she was there for about 11 hours, and to the bitter end, and did her duty representing the neighborhood, and voting her conscience on what she thought was the best candidates that she had an opportunity to vote for. Again, it was long and lengthy, certainly divisive in many parts of it. I am concerned about the divisiveness, speaking as a Republican now, the divisiveness in the party, I'm concerned about people feel disenfranchised because of the process that we're going through here, and the polarization that seems to be evident.

We have approximately 720,000 registered Republicans in the state of Utah, and the fact that they don't feel included, or they're opinions considered, I think is disappointing, and something we need to work on, the Republican party. We are getting away from the patron saint of Republicanism, Ronald Reagan's council to us all, and that is we need to have a big tent, we appreciate a big tent. He said if you agree with me 80% of the time you're my friend. That's good council, it allows for differences of opinion and dialogue without impugning somebody by not being the true branch of the vine, and then he also had another one called 11th Commandment, thou shall not speak evil of thy fellow Republican. Again, I think we've gotten away from that a little bit too much too, so again, I think we have room for improvement. We need to make sure that the voices are heard, and all Republicans have an opportunity to weigh in and be considered with mutual respect and civility.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: But how do you move past the civil war that's going on right now?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I think time will help end that, and that I think you have to play out the legal challenges, I've always said, whatever those legal challenges are, whether you think they're good, bad, or weak, or indifferent, those who believe in it, have got to have the option to go to the very last Appellate Court, and have the courts decide what's legal and what is not, I think that will help bring resolution. 

In the meantime, the focus on the party's got to be on not the lawsuit, and the litigation, on what we call Senate Bill 54 and the statutes we currently have, but it should be on bringing people together, discussing' the issues, supporting the party platform, and really electing Republicans to office. I would say that's probably the same thing for the Democrat Party, for the Libertarian Party, and for others out there, the other parties, I think in the Republican party we have a little bit of an infiltration of Libertarians, who ought to be running as a Libertarian on the Libertarian Party. I think that's a part of the challenge that we have uniquely so in the Republican party too. But I think over time, with the resolution of the litigation, that will help bring us back together, and hopefully stop the infighting.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Have you decided whether to endorse anyone in the U.S. Senate for the 4th District congressional GOP primaries? 

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well, it's been no secret I've encouraged Mitt Romney to run, I thought he brings some unique cache and experience to the Senate. He will not be your typical freshman Senator, if he's fortunate enough to be elected. He understands the national issues having ran for President twice, so that eight years gives him an understanding of international business, international affairs, the challenge we have with world peace and domination out there, particularly with Russia, and the unique challenge we have there, the Middle East. So he comes with a wealth of experience, and I think has opportunity to get into leadership in a much more rapid fashion. I think that's good for the country, I think that's good for Utah.

So, again, I've was encouraged him to run and I'm pleased that he did. That being said, I know Representative Michael Kennedy well, he's a bright guy, he's certainly a principled legislator, and brings his own talent and expertise to the table that's unique to him. So it's going to be an interesting campaign, an interesting race, and we'll see what happens and who ends up becoming the nominee for the Republican party, and faces whoever the nominee for the Democrat party, and the other candidates that are out there in the so-called minor parties.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Endorsement there? You spoke nicely of both of them but...

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well, I encouraged Mitt Romney to run, it's hard for me to not say that my council was taken in vain, and not to support him now, but again, I can tell you, I think we have two good candidates there, and the public is well served when good people, as I said in the beginning, take up their opportunity, and throw their hat in the ring and say pick me, we'll listen to their dialogue. I'm partial to Mitt Romney.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: And the John Curtis and Chris Harrod race?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: This is deja-vu all over again, is it not? Again, I encouraged John Curtis to run again, and he was in a position I endorsed him before, so that's not a surprise to anybody. Again, I think he did much better in convention this time, I think people recognize he's already in the saddle, he has momentum, he's doing some good things, I think you'll find he's going to be a rational, common-sense Republican, conservative, right of center, and I think he's proven that day by day as he's there working. So, I think again, we have to go through the primary race and we'll see what happens, but I think supporting Congressman Curtis, and having him stay there, where he's got some momentum, is probably the right thing to do.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: Governor, any ballot initiatives that you are also taking positions on? Your position on medical marijuana, of course, is well documented but Better Boundaries, or Count My Vote, or Utah Decides.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well, let me talk about the imitative petition process, that's probably a great segway Ben, and something we ought to all appreciate. One, I appreciate the fact that we have an initiative petition process, I think that's important, it's part of our constitution, and that people have the ability to weigh in, when so motivated, saying that maybe the legislature is missing this, or not doing that, or here's something that we need to, in fact, address as a population. I don't think it's a good way to make law. You have no ability to amend it, to modify it, to improve it, whatever the initiative petition is, you vote it up or down, and whatever, if you vote it up it becomes law with all its warts, and maybe imperfections.

So, I applaud the initiative petition process, I think it's good to have the people's voice heard, I'm a little bit off put by those who would go out there, and try to talk people into takin' their signature off the petition. Let's have the debate, let's have the pros and the cons, and let's vote and let the people speak. So for anybody who's out there pushing to take names off, I think that's not good form. 

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: Are you seeing that increasingly happening now?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: We hear the rumors out there on a number of issues, that we say well they're close, let's see if we can go out and torpedo it, by talking people out of, or talking them in to taking their name off the petition, and I worry that there's some distortion, and try to motivate people to do that, and I'm just saying you know what, if they signed, let's have the vote, let's have the debate, that'll be September October, I think we'll have healthy debate on all four, if all four of them qualify for the ballot in November. I think they all have legitimate issues out there to talk about. The one that I've been a little bit more out front and vocal on is the medical marijuana initiative. 

And again, I can tell you, I support medicinal use of marijuana based on science, and based on the ability for a doctor to prescribe it for each individual patient they have, and where we control the quantity and the quality. I think that's the basic essence of medicine, and if we think there's a medicinal use here, we ought to follow that process, so that the public is well served. It is troublesome to me, and it should be to anybody out there, that we in fact ignore a federal law that says it's illegal.

I've sworn to uphold the constitution, the laws, I try to do that. I think everybody else should support that. It's off-putting to me, and a little bit disingenuous to a past administration that seems to be so willing to turn a blind eye to the federal law. When what they should have said, if the law's wrong, let's change the law. Let's take marijuana off the schedule one list, so we can actually do legitimate research.

We've wasted eight years. And it makes it tough, we're trying' to do some studies at the University of Utah, we have a hard time getting product to study, and wouldn't it be nice for all of us, we can kind of put the debate to bed, and say here is what the science tells us, here's the amount of dosage, here's what it'll do, here's how it'll interact with other medicines. Instead, what we got with the initiative, we hold doctors harmless, they can't make a prescription, but they can make a recommendation.

We don't know how it's going to interact with other medications, and they are found to be immune from any kind of prosecution of negligence, any kind of liability. We have the ability to transport marijuana, hither and yon, whether you're using it for recreational purposes or for whatever, and say I have a card here that says it's okay. My semi-truck load, I just have sensitive headaches, and I need to have that. We've got an initiative that has got lack of oversight, and some loop holes in it, that causes concern.

The fact that people, if we don't have a dispensary up on time, can grow their own. As soon as people start growing their own, you lose control. We have the ability, if you're a hundred miles away from a dispensary, you can grow your own. Again, that's not going to be hard to be a hundred miles from a dispensary in the state of Utah, and growing' your own marijuana plants for whatever purpose.

The fact we have doctors, people in the medical profession, not just doctors, your Marcus Welby, M.D. guy down the street, it's physician assistants, it's nurse practitioners, it's optometrists, it's podiatrists, it's a whole plethora of people, that have the ability to say I'm going to recommend to you to get marijuana, no liability on my part, but now you kind of have lack of prosecution, and the ability to actually possess.

So the lack of control, of this substance, ought to cause us pause. What also ought to cause us pause, is we have, as the data shows us, that those who use medical marijuana, and or recreational marijuana the most, the cohort that is the most involved is 18 to 25 year olds. I would submit to us all, they're probably not the one that has chronic health problems. And so you got to wonder what's going' on there, particularly we have a lot of people on medical, and that say that young developing brain probably is not going to be helped if they're going to be out there using marijuana.

Again, I know people talk about, we're not going to smoke it, we're going to have edibles, but how much is the right dosage? What do you put it into too? There's just a lot of unanswered questions. Why don't we just come together and let's make sure we get rid of the bureaucratic delays, let's not be hypocritical about it, let's study it, let's put it on the fast track, let's find out what the science tells us, and let's see if we can't use medical marijuana to alleviate pain and suffering, which we all agree to.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Do you have stands on any of the other ballot initiatives?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well, we can go down them one at a time. The Boundaries, the redistricting commission, again I think having an independent redistricting commission has certainly intellectually good sense to it. I think they'll find that it's not as easy as you would think. I mentioned we have 720,000 Republicans that are registered, we have about 179,000 Democrats. The really, the only issue we're talking about has nothing to do with legislature, everybody kind of agrees to the legislative districts. The other state-wide offices are state-wide, so that's not an issue.

This is about the four congressional districts. But it's, it'll be a little bit of a challenge, if you say well we've got to have a Democrat district only, to do it without some gerrymandering. And that's what we're supposedly trying to get away from, so, if it passes then who do we appoint? That'll make a difference on who's appointed and how they get there, and so it's not going to be, I think exactly the silver bullet that everybody thinks it's going to be, but, I have no opposition to having the independent redistricting, and we need to follow the constitution. Let's see what else have got out there?

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: Count My Vote.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Count My Vote. Again, I think the ability of Count My Vote, which already law, we talked about Count My Vote Senate Bill 54, that's already law. That's the duel pathway to get the nomination, and I think what this initiative does, is it actually make the current statutes better, lowers the threshold on the numbers you have to get the signatures for, and I think that makes it overall better, it's more, I think, functional, and so I think that's an improvement. So we already have the law, I signed it into law, and this will make an improvement, so I think that's a good thing.

The debate on whether it's constitutional or not will continue, and let's let that roll out, and eventual get finality on that end of it. I've been disappointed, and I signed the bill, and I've said before, maybe I should've vetoed the bill. I didn't realize that the vision it was going to create, but I want to remind everybody out there, that the Senate Bill 54, that was a compromise designed specifically to keep the caucus convention system in place, in some form or fashion, because all the polling showed, that if it had gone to the general population and vote in November, it would have passed, and there would be no caucus convention system.

So I think the duel pathway actually is proven to work fairly well, and I think with improvements it's something we can live with. It's not perfect, again I've always gone to caucus convention, I've never missed it, I enjoy meeting with the delegates. I think there's some rationale behind that, but any more people are spending a lot more money trying to stack delegates, and delegates are going there saying I want my, whoever I'm going to support, has to look exactly like me, believe like me, where I'm there on an assignment to vote for my particular one, as opposed to representing the neighborhood and their views, that's where I think we're getting some disenfranchisement, particularly on the Republican side of the ledger. What's the other one?

REPORTERS: Medicaid

MICHAEL ORTON, CAPITAL PRESS CORPS: Are all Utahns covered now, in some fashion Governor?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well, if we get the waivers, we'll pretty well have everybody to 100% of poverty will be covered, and then for those over 100% of poverty, you can go into the Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, and get subsidized healthcare, up to 138%,. That's the intent, it's to allow us to maximize our investment, our taxpayers dollars, to get the best return, and not to buy something today that we can't afford tomorrow.

We have a number of states, a number of governors, are very concerned about, well, it's working now, but I'm concerned about rising costs, inflationary aspects of healthcare, which we're not addressing by the way, the Affordable Care Act only talks about who's going to pay for it. The rising costs continue, and it's becoming more and more of a problem for us, with premiums doubling and tripling in some parts of the country. So we're trying to see if we can't cap it, make sure we are fiscally prudent, cover as many people as we can, and if we get the waivers, we will be able to cover people in some form or fashion, up to 138% of poverty.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: So are you in favor of the ballot initiative, or against the ballot initiative for Medicaid America, Medicaid expansion?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: No, I'm not going to be supporting it, I think we what we've got is a better alternative, my Healthy Utah was a better alternative. When you end up just embracing the Affordable Care Act, you have to embrace the costs that are accompanying it, which means we'll continue to have to spend more, and more, and more. Our costs for Medicaid went from 9% to now we're probably at about 20%, and rising, and with the premium adjustments that is become a bigger, and bigger part of our obligation as a state budget. Democrats and Republicans alike have lamented, before the Affordable Care Act, that Medicaid is the budget buster of all budget busters out in our state budgets, so, it should be a concern if you care about balancing the budget and being fiscally prudent.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: So, if I understand you right, you're cool with Better Boundaries, you're okay with - excuse me - Count My Vote, against medical marijuana, and against Medicaid expansion.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Let me clarify, I'm not against medical marijuana.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: The ballot initiative.

GOVERNOR HERBERT:  I'm against the initiative which I think has got too many loopholes, and leaves a lot of things uncertain, and again I said, leads potentially, doesn't mean it will, potentially leads to the ability to have recreational marijuana, as we've seen in other states, and again, when you can start growing' your own, again we lose control of the product, then certainly people could be out there breaking the law and using it for recreational marijuana. We know that people are already doing' that, breaking' the law, but we need to take a stand, and we need a appreciate that there's a federal law, I've been sworn to uphold the constitutional laws of the land, state and federal. And if the law's wrong, let's change the law, we ought to focus on that, and we ought to get some research and science done to back up, so we know what the product will do, and control the quantity and the quality of what that, and avoid some kind of self-medication.

Reporter: Do you plan to financially support any opposition campaign against that ballot initiative?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I've not been asked to do that, and I don't know that I have any plans to do that, we'll have to see how that develop. I believe the debate's going to happen in September and October as people get through the summer, we'll have the primary elections, and then we'll start concentrating on November, and that will include the initiatives, so I know Ben asked me what's my active participation going to be, and I'm not going to be out knocking on doors, but I'm going to look and see if there's not something' we can do proactively, as a better alternative. I mean, clearly it's an issue that we need to resolve, and there's probably way for us to come together and have a better process, process does count, which would give us a better outcome.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: What do you mean by proactively resolve this, what are you planning?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well there may be some things we can do, I'm going to study, maybe I'm going to bring some experts together pros and cons, listen to the doctors out there, those involved in the science of it, and see if we can ferret through what the truth is verse the fiction. I think there's probably myths on both sides of this issue. But we ought to go through that, and have that dialogue, and then decide what we can do proactively to come together, and if marijuana can be used for medicine, and alleviate pain and suffering, we ought to all be behind it. But there's a process to get to there, and it ought to be treated like a medicine, a controlled substance. And we going to have science with the doctors with confidence can prescribe it, and know that - if you - this is what it's a hundred milligrams, or is it two hundred milligrams, you can't just sprinkle a little bit of seed into your muffins and your brownies, and say yeah I think that's good and trial and error. That's why we've had to make the doctors immune from any kind of prosecution, we're kind of just flying by the seat of our pants here, we can do better, that's all I'm saying.

JULIAN HATTEM, ASSOCIATED PRESS: Are you concerned that the apparent success of some of these initiatives getting on the ballot will encourage activists in coming years to bring their measures to the ballot, such as maybe reforms to alcohol laws or anything else.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I'm not concerned about that at all, I think it is part of the process we have that's available to create law. There's the legislature, and then there's these initiative petitions, I don't think it's a good way, but it is a way, and certainly can get attention, and have the legislature and the governor's office say we maybe we need to pay rapt attention to what the public's motivation here is and see if we can resolve it.

As I mentioned, I think it's not a good way, because you can't modify it and improve it, you can't amend the bill. I don't want to be like California, they end up having you know 50 or 60 or 70, and they sometimes pass laws that are conflicting. And you can't do anything about it, so that's not a good thing, ours is pretty hard to get an initiative petition on the ballot, but you can do it, and if they do it, that means the people really are concerned about it, and we ought to pay attention. So, I think this is an unusual year, because we've got so many that have been proposed, so I don't think this is going to be the breaking of the dam in a deluge of initiative petitions in the future come forward.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: There's also a constitutional amendment that allows the legislature to call itself into session, what do you think about that one?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Yeah, that's something that I would be opposed to, I think we have a system that works very well now, because it says that we have a deadline. I've met with a lot of other governors, some, I met with Governor Schwarzenegger and he lamented the biggest problem he has in California is the legislature never ends, it just keeps going and going there full time.

The fact that we have a 45 day period of time with an actual midnight sine die, you have to get your work done, we have an acceleration the last couple weeks to get things done, and then we adjourn 'til the next year. It would be very easy for people to say, oh we have an emergency here, and emergency there, we need to come back in 30 days. I don't think that's healthy, I don't think that's good for the legislature, because they're always going to be on call, and that is close to the full time legislature, that's not good for Utah, so I'm opposed to that.

ERIK NEILSEN, KUED: Governor, once again, we've run out time. Thank you for joining us.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Thank you, great to be with you.

NARRATOR: This has been the Governor's Monthly News Conference, an archive of transcripts, video, and audio is available online. Please visit Kued.org. Thanks for joining us.

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