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Congressman Matheson urges bipartisanship in final address to Utah House
Summary
Congressman Matheson told the Utah House he will finish his term in the U.S. House and urged elected officials to work across party lines, criticizing the recent federal shutdown and backing bipartisan fixes to voting law and redistricting reforms.
Congressman Matheson, U.S. representative, used his visit to the Utah House to urge lawmakers to resist polarization and to seek common ground in policymaking. Speaking as he prepares to leave the U.S. House, Matheson said elected officials should "extend a hand rather than drawing a line in the sand" and placed a premium on working across party lines to accomplish long-term goals.
Matheson criticized the partial federal government shutdown last fall as "a complete failure" of strategy and said it hurt national parks and the broader economy; he cited a Standard & Poor's estimate that the shutdown cost the national economy roughly $24,000,000,000. "Nobody won. Everybody lost," he said. He also described his legislative priorities, including channeling federal resources for infrastructure projects and securing compensation for downwinders exposed to nuclear testing.
On voting protections, Matheson told Representative Chavez Houck he supports a bipartisan House bill to revise portions of the Voting Rights Act that the Supreme Court asked Congress to redo after its recent ruling. He said Representative Sensenbrenner is leading a bipartisan effort in the House and that he plans to back it.
Matheson discussed political reforms he called worth watching, pointing to California's experiment with an independent redistricting commission and a top-two primary as potential ways to increase participation and reduce incentives for extreme partisanship. "Good ideas can come from either political party or from people who don't care a thing about politics," he said.
During a question-and-answer period, Matheson backed efforts to reimburse states that fronted costs during the government shutdown. After a representative described Utah's decision to advance about $1.7 million to reopen national parks and said the state received roughly $700,000 back, Matheson said he would support seeking the remaining reimbursement through the appropriations process.
Matheson closed by reiterating his belief that representative government works when officials seek compromise. "Our constituents deserve nothing less," he said.
Speakers quoted in this article appear in the House transcript; at the time of the remarks Matheson identified himself as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. No formal action followed his address; the House recessed from the Committee of the Whole after the visit.
