Rep. Karen Peterson is retiring from one of Utah's safest Republican seats. Erik Craythorne (R), Jeffrey Anderson (D), and Tony De Mille (Utah Forward Party) are running to replace her — and their campaign finance filings, business records, and city meeting minutes tell three very different stories.
Both party primaries went uncontested. Below is each candidate's full 2026 campaign finance picture, from their own disclosures.utah.gov filings.
Every one of De Mille's seven contributions is a personal loan to his own campaign. No PAC, party, or outside individual donor appears anywhere in his filing.
Confirmed from all three parties' own campaign finance disclosures — not a tip, not a claim, but three independent primary sources agreeing on a single date.
Teuscher sponsored H.B. 33 (Political Signs Amendments) in the House; Vickers carried it in the Senate. Craythorne was not a sitting legislator when the bill passed and had no vote on it — the connection is to the funding network around the bill's sponsors, not to his own legislative record, which doesn't exist yet.
Cross-reference: H.B. 33 Political Signs Amendments Cross-reference: Election Hive LLCTwo LLCs, formed nearly a decade apart, with the identical three-party ownership structure.
Formed October 2015, administratively dissolved January 2022. Registered agent: Erik Craythorne, individually. Members: Craythorne Development, Inc.; Ed Green Construction, Inc.; and Mike Schultz, Inc. — with Schultz also listed personally as Manager.
Formed February 2024 — the identical three-party partnership, reconstituted about three months after Schultz became House Speaker (November 2023). This entity is one of the eight Craythorne discloses on his own conflict-of-interest form — and it's also transparently listed on Schultz's own disclosure form, as a directly owned entity and income source. Neither side hid this partnership from state disclosure requirements.
The actual project behind this LLC: a 43-lot single-family subdivision at approximately 2600 West 300 North in West Point. The city approved its rezone and development agreement on June 20, 2023.
Timing: dissolved before Speakership, re-formed afterThe Hive grades findings like these on five standing questions: does it check power, is the process actually visible, who pays and who's protected from paying, what's the environmental cost, and who bears the cost or has standing to be heard. A process can be designed correctly and still produce a weak outcome — or the reverse.
The disclosure form exists so voters can weigh a candidate's outside interests before handing him legislative power. This role didn't appear on it — not visible from his own filing, only found through independent registry research. The HOA governs his own company's subdivision, so the residents living under it may not know its president is also their developer and a legislative candidate.
Both Craythorne's and Schultz's own disclosure forms list Whitesides Place LLC directly — the paperwork was done correctly on both sides. But neither form tells an ordinary reader that it's a shared entity between the two of them; that connection only surfaces by cross-referencing both filings against the state's own LLC registry, work most voters will never do. The actual subdivision behind it got its rezone and development agreement from a city Craythorne used to lead, years after he left office.
Worth naming plainly as the positive case: Craythorne identified his own conflict, disclosed it on the record, and physically stepped aside for a different presiding officer. This is the standard working as intended, not a non-story to skip past.
Craythorne served as West Point Mayor for 13 years. His family's development company had active land-use business before that city across multiple years — with a mixed record on disclosure.
West Point City Council considered removing the Craythorne Homestead Subdivision Phase 1 from its one-year warranty — his final meeting as Mayor. The minutes record it plainly:
He identified the conflict himself and stepped aside. This is the process working as intended.
A March 2019 West Point meeting document lists both "Discussion Regarding the Murray PRUD Overlay Zone" and, separately, "PRUD Overlay Zone – Craythorne Const." — two distinct family development matters before the city in the same period, during his mayoral tenure. Whether these carried the same disclosure and recusal as the 2021 item has not been independently checked.
The city approved the Whitesides Place rezone and development agreement in June 2023. In May 2024, Craythorn Homestead, LLC applied to rezone 20.85 acres from R-2 to R-4 — nearly tripling allowed density — at a property the city had already granted a general plan amendment for in December 2023. Both came after he'd left office.
Craythorne's conflict-of-interest disclosure lists eight business entities and one board seat. State corporate registry records were checked against every one, plus several more not listed, to establish who actually controls what.
| Entity | Status | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Craythorne Inc. | His, disclosed | President — matches his own home address exactly |
| Craythorne Construction Co., Inc. (1979) | His | Vice President — separate address from his father, President Richard D. Craythorne |
| Craythorne Commercial / Tin Cup, LLC | Likely his | Sole member "Erik R. Craythorne" — matches his confirmed middle name pattern |
| Sevier Canyon Properties, LLC | Nuance | COI form says "manager/partner" — state's own record lists his father as sole Member |
| Craythorne Investment, LLC | Not his | Registered agent is Richard Craythorne — his father |
| Bennett Legacy Farms HOA | Undisclosed | President & Trustee, full name on filing — not on his COI form |
Craythorne's own company markets an active West Point neighborhood, "Bennett Farms," off 4000 West — almost certainly the same development as Bennett Legacy Farms, where state filings show him as President and Trustee under his full name, Erik Richard Craythorne. That role does not appear on his conflict-of-interest form, which lists only his Sportsmen for Fish & Wildlife board seat. His wife, Jil, is also a Trustee; his father, Richard D. Craythorne, is a separate Officer.
Retired. His only disclosed business is Tidy Time Rentals LLC, an appliance rental company he co-owns with his wife, Donna Faye Anderson. No board or leadership positions disclosed. His campaign ran almost entirely on small individual checks, most under $100.
Realtor, owner of Big Tony Realty LLC. Previously a warehouse and transportation manager at Hale Center Theater. His campaign has taken in no outside money at all — every dollar is a personal loan.
HD-13 covers Clearfield, Clinton, and West Point — R+32.0 on the 2024 presidential baseline, one of the state's safest Republican seats. Karen Peterson won her two full elections 61.4% and 71.9% before retiring. Both party primaries this year were uncontested; a fourth Republican candidate, Roxayn Elmer, filed but reported zero campaign finance activity.