LDS Dems take center stage at Monday's Democratic luncheon

The featured speaker at Monday's Democratic tele-luncheon will be Eric Biggart, Chair of LDS Democrats of America. The group, which is not affiliated the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, has as its slogan, "Same faith. Same values. Different perspective." Their mission, as laid out on their Facebook page, is to “promote the full participation of Latter-day Saints in the Democratic Party. We do this by providing educational and social resources to progressive, moderate, and conservative Democrats who are also LDS, and others who are interested in participating in a ‘no shouting’ environment.”

Mr. Biggart is currently Senior Advisor to Salt Lake County's Democratic Mayor Jenny Wilson, and serves as Senior Strategic Consultant to the Mayor for COVID-19 Response. He earned Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Brigham Young University in 2010 and a Master of Public Administration degree from the University of Utah in 2017. He says that he started to really care about politics the day he finished Harry Reid’s memoir. “His story inspired me and his quiet toughness was a model for who I wanted to become.”

Salt Lake County, the central county of the Salt Lake City metropolitan area, has a population of 1,160,437, which includes Salt Lake City's 200,567. Though Utah as a whole is over 60% LDS, Salt Lake County is far more diverse. Fewer than half the county's population now identify as Mormon, and only around half are currently active in the Church. And although it's known all over the world as the headquarters of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Church membership is strongly aligned with the Republican Party, the citizens of Salt Lake City have elected an uninterrupted string of Democratic mayors going back to the 1970's. If you're a Democrat in Salt Lake, LDS or not, you don't have to feel lonely.

The number of Democratic and Independent members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in America has risen over the past 25 years while the number of Republicans has declined according to a 2016 Pew Research poll. The Church officially identifies itself as non-partisan, and encourages its members to vote whatever way they like. And for years, in fact, members were actually all over the place politically. “In the 19th century they were seen as a radical group,” Patrick Mason, professor of Mormon history and culture at Utah State University told Nate Hegyi of Mountain West News. “But in the 20th century, that all changed. After World War II, Latter-day Saints, for the most part, gravitated towards conservatism and towards the Republican Party.”

The shift to the right really accelerated during the culture wars of the 1960s and 1970s, according to Mason. “They were especially worried about the removal of prayer from schools and about the issues of civil rights, feminism, gay rights and abortion.” It was those social issues that made 63% Church members join the Republican Party by 1992. But in the 21st century some younger church members have opted out of the culture wars. “They’re more interested in things like the environment, climate change and social justice issues,” says Prof. Mason.

And Church leadership seems to have taken notice. It recently wrote a letter to the Trump administration strenuously objecting to its treatment of families at the southern border, and it has gradually become more accepting of LGBTQ individuals. Still, Prof. Mason says that older, more traditional church members still see the Democratic Party as “the party of gay rights, the party of abortion, and the party of big government.”

Eric Biggart thinks that's a shame. He has trouble understanding how socially conservative members of the Church square their faith with a president like Donald Trump. “Can you be a member of the LDS Church in good standing by supporting a president who has had three seperate marriages, two affairs, children from multiple women and unknown other intimate relationships with questionable people?” he asks, adding “The purpose of the gospel is to bring people together, not draw them apart.”

Mitt Romney of Utah was the lone Senate Republican to vote in favor of removing President Trump from office during February's impeachment trial. On the Senate floor, he gave an emotional speech calling himself a profoundly religious person who had sworn an oath before God to exercise impartial justice. “I voted with him 80%of the time,” he said. “But my promise before God to apply impartial justice required that I put my personal feelings and political biases aside.” Romney’s stand illustrates how Utah and the Church are unique, according to Eric Biggart. “Utah is not like any other red state in the entire nation. It’s fundamentally a state that was founded by outcasts.” Now a new generation of LDS outcasts are starting to move their church in a new, more progressive direction.

According to a 2013 Gallup survey, Mormons in the United States are heavily concentrated in the West. Six in 10 Utah residents said they belonged to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Idaho ranked second at 24 percent. Wyoming came in third with 9 percent. Next on the list are Nevada and four other states that have about 4-5 percent of their residents in the LDS church: Montana, Arizona, Hawaii and Alaska. Washington, Colorado and Oregon round out the top of the list with 3 percent each. Nationally, Mormons account for about 2 percent of the U.S. adult population. The Mormon faith has reached 15 million members worldwide, of which 6.3 million are in the United States.

Sponsored by the Democratic Men's Committee, this event is scheduled for noon on Monday, August 31st, and will be held online via Zoom teleconference due to the temporary shutdown of in-person venues. Those wishing to be on distribution for a link to the teleconference can email Rich Dunn, Men's Committee Events Coordinator, at richdunn@aol.com.