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SALT LAKE CITY — Utah voters are used to selecting candidates with an "R" or "D" next to their name, but a new political party could soon enter the mix after the Utah Forward Party on Wednesday filed the paperwork to qualify.
Third parties have been a source of hope for some and trepidation for others in the run-up to the 2024 election, as the No Labels group has floated the possibility of running a presidential candidate. But unlike No Labels, the Forward Party is focused on building from the ground up, according to former Massachusetts Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, board member of the party.
"The Forward Party is a grassroots, bottom-up party," she told KSL.com following a press conference at the Capitol on Wednesday. "So, while we may be speaking to many of the same voters, we actually are trying to build at the Forward Party a long-term alternative, not just something that's a one-off for one election."
Healey, who served under then-Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney from 2003 to 2007, said the party is focused on finding middle-ground issues in each state to appeal to voters on both sides of the aisle. In Utah, that issue is affordable housing.
"We don't want to be dictating, from the national level, what precisely those policies should be ... it's going to be very different in North Dakota than it is going to be in Florida or New York," she said.
However, she made it clear the national party remains steadfast in support of the Constitution, democratic institutions and the rule of law. Healey said she was a Republican for 43 years but left the party following the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol insurrection.
Though, she "sincerely hopes" the GOP returns to its roots, she had been searching for a new political home before she landed with the Forward Party.
"I feel that the Republican Party left me," she said. "And my views, my core values, my conservative values, are still very much the same, but I didn't see a way to express those in the current Republican Party. So, I was looking for a group that valued the Constitution, valued the rule of law, wanted to be collaborative and was really putting the best interest of the American people first."
In this way, Healey seems to have taken a page out of her former governor's book. Romney has long been critical of the direction of the Republican Party under Donald Trump, and has said "a very large portion of my party really doesn't believe in the Constitution."
Healey said she hasn't spoken with Romney about joining the Forward Party but she hopes it's something "he takes an interest in."
The Utah Forward Party isn't the only third party to launch in the state in recent years, after the United Utah Party launched in 2017. January Walker, who is running as a United Utah Party candidate for Utah's 2nd Congressional seat, spoke in support of another third party in Utah.
While she's still running as a member of United Utah, she said a "large tent" of options is better for voters.
"I plan to continue to be involved with the United Utah Party and continue to support the Forward Party," she said. "I think both of them have very similar missions, and so as long as they continue to support the people and put the people first ... I'll put my support anywhere that is."
