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Utah requires a two-thirds vote in the Legislature for a tax bill to be immune from a citizen referendum. Get less than that, and voters can force the law onto the ballot if they gather enough signatures in time.
S.B. 2001 raised the state sales tax on grocery food from 1.75% to the full 4.85% rate, packaged with an income-tax cut and a new gas tax. It passed without a two-thirds majority in either chamber. A coalition led by former Rep. Fred Cox, backed by Harmons, the Utah PTA, and Utahns Against Hunger, gathered 152,000 signatures — well over the 115,869 needed — to put the law to a statewide vote.
Before the Lt. Governor's office finished verifying those signatures, the Legislature repealed the entire law itself via H.B. 185, introduced on the second day of the very next general session.
What Changed, Section by Section
| S.B. 2001 (Dec. 12, 2019) | |
|---|---|
| Grocery sales tax | Raised from 1.75% to the full 4.85% rate, packaged with an income-tax cut and a new gas tax |
| Vote margin | Passed without the two-thirds majority that would have made it immune to referendum |
| The Referendum Effort | |
| Led by | Former Rep. Fred Cox, backed by Harmons, the Utah PTA, and Utahns Against Hunger |
| Signatures submitted | 152,000 on Jan. 21, 2020, against a 115,869-signature threshold |
| H.B. 185 (2020) | |
| What it did | Repealed S.B. 2001 in its entirety; introduced the second day of the next general session, before signature verification was complete |
The Timeline
- Dec 12, 2019S.B. 2001 signed in the 2nd Special Session, without a two-thirds majority in either chamber.
- Jan 21, 2020Referendum organizers submit 152,000 signatures, above the 115,869-signature threshold.
- Jan 2020H.B. 185 is introduced on the second day of the next general session, proposing to repeal S.B. 2001 outright.
- Feb 2020H.B. 185 passes and is signed. Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox confirms the referendum will not appear on the ballot.
Graded against the standing rubric
This isn't a personal opinion of the bill. The grade below asks two questions, applied the same way to every bill in this series — not whether any one person likes the outcome: 1. Power — does it add or remove a check on power that the public, collectively, would otherwise have no say over? 2. Transparency — does it add or remove what the public can actually see about the process, regardless of who ends up holding the final decision? Design and outcome are graded separately because a bill can be structurally sound and still fail to become law, or pass in a form very different from how it started — collapsing the two into one score would hide which one actually happened.
The Tax Bill As Passed
A significant tax increase pushed through a special session without the vote margin that would have made it referendum-proof.
What Happened to the Referendum
The Legislature didn't lose a public vote on this law — it made sure the vote never happened.
Graded by the Collective Rubric
This is The Weber County Hive's standing five-part rubric, applied the same way across every piece: Power — does it add or remove a check on power the public would otherwise have no say over? Transparency — can the public actually see the process? Financial Accountability — who actually pays, and is that disclosed plainly? Environmental Impact — is the effect on water, wetlands, and wildlife treated as a real constraint or a box to check? Community Impact — who bears the cost or holds a stake in this decision, and did they get real standing to be heard?
| Criterion | Grade | Assessment |
|---|---|---|
| Power | F | A qualified referendum — the public's direct check on legislative tax power — was preempted before it could reach voters. |
| Transparency | D | The original tax hike moved through a special session; the repeal moved fast enough to outrun signature verification. |
| Financial Accountability | C | The grocery tax increase itself was itemized and public, even if the process around it wasn't. |
| Environmental Impact | N/A | Not applicable to a tax-restructuring bill. |
| Community Impact | F | A grocery tax increase falls hardest on lower-income households — the exact group a successful referendum would have let weigh in directly. |
The public's own referendum check was mooted by the body it was meant to check.
How This Could Have Actually Protected the Public
- Pass major tax changes with the two-thirds majority the law itself sets as the referendum-proof threshold, rather than relying on repeal-and-moot as a backstop
- Let a qualified referendum reach the ballot even if the Legislature later wants to change course — repeal a law prospectively, but let the public vote on the version signatures were actually collected against
- Require any repeal of a referendum-targeted law to wait until signature verification is complete
Part of a Larger Pattern
This case is one of eight in "Bills That Did the Opposite," a cross-bill tracker documenting Utah legislation where the public description stayed the same while the substance was quietly swapped out mid-process.
Sources
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Sources
Show sources ▸Hide sources ▾- S.B. 2001 (2019 2nd Special Session) and H.B. 185 (2020), official bill text — le.utah.gov
- Ballotpedia summary of the referendum effort and repeal
- Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox's confirmation that the referendum would not appear on the ballot