Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, one of the few Republican governors who had not yet endorsed former President Donald Trump, announced Friday he will both endorse and vote for Trump in November’s presidential election.
During his monthly press conference on Friday morning, Cox said he will “do everything I can to help” Trump win the election and unify the country.
“My commitment to him was that I would help him try to lower the temperature in this country, and I sincerely hope — from what I’ve heard from people around him — that he’s committed to that,” Cox said.
Hours before the news conference, the Deseret News first reported Cox’s intentions to endorse Trump. According to a letter obtained by the Deseret News, written by Cox on his official Utah letterhead and dated July 14, Cox informed Trump earlier this week of his intent to support the Republican nominee. Cox said Trump’s “life was spared” during Saturday’s attempted assassination and pledged his support to Trump being a unifying candidate in the aftermath.
“Now,” Cox wrote, “because of that miracle, you have the opportunity to do something that no other person on earth can do right now: unify and save our country.” Cox pleaded with Trump to be “a Lincoln to bring us together.”
Just last week, Cox said he didn’t plan to vote for Trump. “I’m not going to vote for either presidential candidate this year,” Cox said during an appearance on CNN on July 10. Instead, he said, he planned to write in a candidate. Cox said he did not vote for Trump in 2016 or 2020.
In February, Cox said Republicans would be making “a huge mistake” if they nominated Trump as their presidential nominee.
Cox has claimed he is not “anti-Trump,” only that he has “serious issues” with some of the former president’s policies and antics. After the Jan. 6 riot, Cox called on Trump to resign, saying it “would be good for the nation.” Last month, Politico declared Cox “the new face of Trump skepticism on the right.”
Cox ‘will do everything he can to help’ Trump, he says at conference
During his news conference, Cox detailed his thinking on Trump and the 2024 election. The hinge point, he said, was Saturday’s assassination attempt on Trump. “I spent (Saturday) night distraught, worried about our nation and what we’d become and who we are,” he said. He spent the next day “in contemplation” and “prayed a lot,” and decided to write a letter to Trump detailing his thinking.
In the letter, Cox said: “I believe in our better angels, Mr. President, and I believe you are capable of being that kind of leader for this troubled nation. It is a huge burden to be placed on any person,” Cox continued, “but I want you to know that I pledge my support and I know that millions of others will rally to that kind of leadership.”
Cox expressed sympathy toward the former president in the wake of the attempted assassination. “My wife Abby and I watched in disbelief as we saw the images of the attack on your life,” he wrote. “In that moment you represented the best of America at one of our very worst times. Bloodied but not bowed. Courage — literally — under fire.”
Cox noted that Trump’s statements after the shooting showed “a side of you most of us have not seen, and it gave so many of us tremendous hope for the future of our country.”
Instead of lashing out with “hate” and “violence,” Cox counseled, Trump has the chance to “unify and save our country.”
“I fear that America is on the precipice of unmitigated disaster,” Cox wrote. “We need to turn down the temperature and find ways to come together again before it’s too late.”
Cox noted that he and Trump “have some differences, and you probably don’t like me very much. And that’s OK. … I’m not writing this letter looking for a position in your Cabinet or a role on your team.”
Instead, Cox is looking for him “to do something that people have said is impossible,” he wrote:
“You have a chance to build a coalition of support that our country has not seen since Ronald Reagan. And you don’t have to compromise on a single conservative policy in order to do it. By treating President Biden with basic human dignity and respect and by emphasizing unity rather than hate, you will win this election by an historic margin and become one of our nation’s most transformational leaders. By extending an olive branch to voters who are open to persuasion and ignoring the extremists, you can solidify a legacy as one of the most important presidents in our nation’s 250-year history. You can make your success, in leading our country to a new era of peace, unity, and prosperity, the greatest way to silence your critics.”
The letter was sent by Cox to Rock Bordelon and Keith Mark, the two leaders of Hunter Nation, an outdoor recreation and advocacy group that counts Donald Trump Jr. among its board members. The two men were en route to Wisconsin where they hosted an event with Trump Jr. Monday afternoon. Trump Jr. then hand-delivered the letter to his father, according to Don Peay, who learned about the logistics firsthand.
“Gov. Cox is a great governor,” Mark said in a statement. “A man of faith, like in Biblical times. We can and are seeing a mighty change of Heart.”
‘He’s never said things like he said in the past week’
On Friday morning, Cox said he has “reason to believe” Trump has changed and will try to “bring the temperature down.”
“People have been trying to ask him to do this for years, and he’s never said things like he said in the past week,” Cox said, referring to Trump’s statements after the assassination attempt and his speech at the Republican National Convention on Thursday night.
According to an individual close to Cox’s thinking, the governor planned to watch Trump’s speech Thursday and publicize his support for the former president if he felt he sufficiently attempted to unite the country.
Shortly after Trump’s speech, Cox thanked Trump via a post on X. “This is a winning message and one our nation desperately needs right now,” he wrote. “Utah stands ready to help you heal the division in our nation.”
The New York Times mistakenly reported that Cox attended the RNC in Milwaukee as Trump’s guest Thursday night. Cox was in Utah.
“I’ve invited Cox for months (to the convention), and would’ve loved for him to be here,” Utah GOP chair Rob Axson said Thursday night, shortly after Trump’s speech concluded. “I welcome an opportunity of unity with him, as well. Hopefully we see that.”
During the Friday news conference, Cox said disagreeing better — the theme of his tenure as chair of the National Governors Association — is something he believes in. “I preach it,” he said. “I try to live by it. I’m not very good at it. I know that former President Trump isn’t very good at it — hasn’t been for a long time. That’s been one of my biggest struggles, for sure. And yet, there’s a willingness to try. And that’s all I can ask for and hope for.”
Cox said his endorsement was based on Trump’s apparent willingness to be a unifying candidate. “I told him in that letter, ‘If you’ll do this, I will do everything I can to help and support you.’ And so that’s what I’m doing.”
Cox acknowledged they will likely have disagreements — “I’ve always considered myself a Ronald Reagan conservative, but certainly there are some differences between that in the party,” he said — and Cox doesn’t expect his endorsement to help Trump win. “He doesn’t need my help to win at all,” Cox said. “That’s just going to happen. But I do think that I can help and be a voice when it comes to helping to to unify our nation, when it comes to helping to lower the temperature and to reduce political violence.”
