New red state elections official says women in office ‘do not have what it takes’

Kai Schwemmer, who has been given the title of confidential administrative associate to the Utah County clerk. (Photo courtesy of Kai Schwemmer)

A longtime fixture in local government, Lorene Kamalu’s seen controversy come and go. But she was shocked last week to learn that the newest elections officer in the state was a young conservative influencer who’s described himself as “anti-universal suffrage” and declared “women generally do not have what it takes to endure the pressures of a public office.”

Kamalu, a Republican running for a third term as Davis County commissioner, recalled thinking, “How could this be happening in this day and age? How could this be happening, you know, in the U.S., in very important elected offices? And then, how in the world is this happening in Utah?”

Kamalu is among dozens of women in elected office who signed an open letter calling for “trust, professionalism and equal respect in Utah County elections” after 23-year-old Kai Schwemmer was named deputy county clerk, despite his remarks about women and lack of experience running elections. Other critics vented their frustration at a public meeting last week.

In response to the outcry, Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson gave Schwemmer a new title this week of confidential administrative associate. In a job description posted Tuesday on the county’s website, Davidson listed the role’s functions as those of “a project manager, external liaison, and key representative,” as well as a personal assistant to the clerk. He has said the position would be temporary but did not give a timeline in the document.

Schwemmer, a student at Brigham Young University and officer in the College Republicans of America, said he’s happy about the change in job description. He told Utah News Dispatch the new role “probably more accurately reflects where I should be, than the chief deputy position.”

Schwemmer streamed for years on a platform founded by white nationalist Nick Fuentes and made remarks in that time criticized as racist and antisemitic, but distanced himself Thursday from those comments and his statement on women in office.

“I do believe fundamentally that every single one of us was made in the image of a loving Heavenly Father,” Schwemmer said. He went on to add that “any idea of, you know, hating a person or believing that they are less than, because of some immutable characteristic, is fundamentally — it fundamentally is incongruent with what is most important to my worldview.”

Schwemmer told Utah News Dispatch he’s not a “groyper” — the term for followers of Fuentes, who’s called for the U.S. to be a white, Christian nation. Schwemmer said that’s not a vision he has for the country. Asked to spell out how his views align or diverge with Fuentes, he said, “I don’t think that’s a productive way of discussing political alignment.”

The duties of his revised role include working on long-term planning and managing the budget, the description says. But unlike the previous title of chief deputy, the new job does not make Schwemmer the default to take over as top elections official in the event the clerk has to step away for one of many reasons, said Utah County Commissioner Amelia Powers Gardner, an author of the letter and the county’s former elections clerk.

Powers Gardner called the revised role “much more appropriate,” saying in an interview that “I’m going to take the win that at least he’s not in an authoritative position now.”

When it comes to women in leadership, Powers Gardner noted “the community that he enjoys today is being run by dozens of us.”

In response to a comment in November from former Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican who resigned from office after breaking with President Donald Trump, Schwemmer said on the social media site X that “women generally do not have what it takes to endure the pressures of a public office and this is a perfect example.Hey Marg, literally everyone on the internet with any clout gets death threats, you’re not a special case.”

Schwemmer said Thursday he was frustrated with Greene for stepping down when he wrote the post and “it kind of sucks whenever I see somebody taking it to mean that there are no women who can lead effectively or anything like that.”

He told Utah News Dispatch that he’s “had the opportunity in the last year and a half here in Utah, being more active locally, to get to know some truly incredible and very strong and fierce women who are fighting for issues that I think are really important, and I would happily trade dozens of men for a single one of them, so that would be my big thing.”

Statewide, more Utah women are serving in government, with an increase in the state Legislature driven by a growing number of Republican women, according to the Utah Women & Leadership Project.

Davidson, the Utah County clerk, has said he hired Schwemmer to better reach first-time voters whose ballots are sometimes rejected because their signatures look different than on their driver’s licenses.

“You’re making this a bigger issue than it should be,” Davidson told Utah News Dispatch on Wednesday. He said criticism of Schwemmer’s past statements has not considered enough of the context around those comments.

“This is an issue about reaching first-time voters. And you, the media, and these 80 women are politicizing it, and mainly because I’m running for office right now, and I’m trying not to delve into that,” Davidson continued. “I don’t want to address their letter, because I don’t want to sound like I’m using my position to advocate for me running for office.”

He said Schwemmer, in his work for the county, is getting in touch with schools and other institutions in hopes of trying to reach young voters of all stripes and educate them so their ballots get counted.

“He is committed that he is not going to politicize it at all and make it a female-male issue,” Davidson said. “This is a first-time voter issue, and that is it.”

Davidson faces a challenge in the race for Utah County clerk from fellow Republican Corey Astill.

Schwemmer, for his part, said in a statement laying out his commitment to residents of the county that he has two priorities: “ensuring that voter outreach remains nonpartisan in principle and practice, as well as improving ballot validation rates among young voters.”

Provo Mayor Marsha Judkins, also a former state lawmaker and signer of the open letter, noted social media algorithms reward high engagement, creating extra incentive to make inflammatory posts.

“Kai is young,” Judkins said. “His brain has not fully developed. His frontal lobe still has time, right? I’m hoping in 10 years, 20 years, he’s going to look back on this and think, ‘what was I doing?’”

Still, she said, Schwemmer espouses views “that are hurtful and harmful, that denigrate and degrade over half the population. I just don’t see that there should be a role for that person in government.”

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