The U.S. Supreme Court ended Monday five years of legal battles by the Utah Republican Party to quash a 2014 election law that allows candidates to qualify for the ballot by collecting signatures and/or through the caucus-convention system.
It refused to hear the party’s challenge of that law, called SB54, rejecting the party’s arguments that it unconstitutionally interferes with its right to choose how to select its own nominees.
The Utah GOP prefers an older system that relied only on the caucus-convention system. If candidates won enough votes at a convention, they could skip a primary.
Critics said that old system gave too much power to delegates, who tend to be much more conservative that most voters.