Trump wins huge victory in Sanpete, racking up more votes than Spencer Cox
By Suzanne Dean
Publisher
11-4-2020
MANTI—President Donald Trump won a huge victory in Sanpete County Tuesday, capturing 82.5 percent of votes cast for president and racking up even more votes than favorite son Spencer Cox received in his race for governor.
Trump received 9,709 to 1,673 for Biden, according to unofficial results released about 11:30 p.m. That left Biden 14.2 percent of the Sanpete votes, with the rest going to minor-party candidates or write-ins.
Sanpete County Clerk Sandy Neill said about 500 ballots were outstanding and she expected to have a complete count Wednesday.
Cox, a Republican who lives in Fairview, appeared certain to be elected Utah’s next governor, the first governor from Sanpete County since the early 1900s.
As of 1 a.m. Wednesday, he and his lieutenant governor running mate, Deidre Henderson, had 64 percent of the vote statewide to about 31 percent for Democrat Chris Peterson and his running mate Karina Brown.
In Sanpete County, Cox got 9,619 votes, or 82.4 percent of votes cast in for governor. Peterson came up with 934 or 8 percent. The rest went to minor-party candidates or write-ins.
In Congressional District 2, which takes in Sanpete County south of Pigeon Hollow Junction, incumbent Republican Chris Stewart appeared to have won reelection. In the district as a whole, as of 1 a.m., he was leading Democrat Kael Weston by 61 to about 35 percent.
In Sanpete County, Stewart had 4,899 votes, or 85 percent, to 668 for Weston, or a little under 12 percent.
In Congressional District 4, the area north of Pigeon Hollow Junction, Republican Burgess Owens, who allied strongly with Trump, was trailing incumbent Democrat Ben McAdams, 49.5 to 46 percent in the district as a whole.
But in conservative Sanpete County, Owens had 4,064, or nearly 74 percent of the vote, while McAdams had 1,085, or just under 20 percent.
Former Utah Rep. Derrin Owens of Fountain Green was easily elected to the Utah State Senate. Running against Warren Rogers of the Independent American Party, he got 90 percent of the vote in the 10 counties in the district.
In Sanpete County, his home county, he got 9,824, or 89 percent of the vote, to 11 percent for Rogers.
Steve Lund of Manti, a Sanpete County commissioner, won his race for the Utah House of Representatives in District 58, which takes in Sanpete and Juab counties.
Running against Russell Hatch, a Constitution Party candidates who is also from Manti and a J. Homer Morrill, a United Utah Party candidate from Juab County, Lund ended up with just under 85 percent of the vote in the two counties combined.
Reed Hatch of Manti, who retired recently as Sanpete County recorder, was elected to the county commission over Larry Smith of Ephraim, a Snow College professor who ran on the Utah United ticket.
As of Tuesday night, Hatch had 78 percent of the votes to 22 percent for Smith.
