Hello everyone and welcome to the focus group podcast I'm Sarah Longwell

publisher of the bulwark and this week we're taking you to Utah, where

there's an interesting primary for US Senate and where Republican voters are built just

a little bit different.

And that's actually what we're going to talk about today because the Church of Jesus

Christ of Latter Day Saints is the beating heart of Utah and of its Republican electorate.

The best known Mormon from Utah in contemporary politics is obviously Mitt Romney,

the 2012 GOP presidential nominee turned anti-Trump renegade who's on his way out of office.

The current governor of Utah is also notably different from the National GOP.

It's much kinder gentler soul.

But these kinds of Republicans are facing headwinds even in Utah.

We're going to talk about those headwinds and the role of the Mormon Church in politics more broadly.

My guest today is McKay Coppins, staff writer at the Atlantic, an author of the excellent book.

Romney, a reckoning, right here here we got it look I hold up books now on my

show okay thanks for being I love it I'm so glad that you have that in your hands that no better product placement than

having Sarah hold that up on this show. I love it. This was an amazing work my friend.

This was awesome. For a political nerd like me, nothing better and I appreciate you being here. Just a quick note up front, I'm going to use the term Mormon in this show, you know, like you doing your reporting to save syllables. So let's get into it. In 2016 Ted Cruz

won the Utah caucuses with almost 70% of the vote and Evan McMullen, my old friend

Evan got over 20% in the general election. In 2024 Donald Trump beat

Mickey Haley in Utah 5643. It seems like Utah and the Mormons there were more

resistant than most to MAGA capture, but that's eroding.

And that sort of was clear, I think, in some of our focus groups.

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