The Utah Senate has confirmed two new Utah Supreme Court justices. The additions of Jay Jorgensen and Stephen Dent are in response to the Legislature’s expansion of the court from five to seven seats.
Senate Democrats and a group of attorneys have raised concerns about the new justices. The two men were appointed by Gov. Spencer Cox.
All Republicans voted in favor of confirmation at Wednesday’s special session in the Senate, but some Democrats opposed putting Dent and Jorgensen on the bench. Dent was confirmed 25 to 4, and Jorgensen was confirmed 22 to 7.
Democrats questioned whether Jorgensen meets the constitutional residency requirements for being on the state’s highest court, which says justices must be “Utah residents for five years preceding selection.” The former corporate attorney, who is now general counsel for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, grew up in Utah and received his education at Brigham Young University, but worked mainly outside of Utah from about 1999 to 2020
Jorgensen moved back to Utah from Korea in December 2020. He then served a church mission in Chile from 2022 to 2025.
“We always intended to return, as evidenced by all the things we talked about,” Jorgensen said during his confirmation hearing before a Senate Committee.
He believes he was still a Utah resident while temporarily away for religious service. Under oath, Jorgensen said he believes he meets the requirement. Senate Republicans agreed, some dismissing the residency concerns as partisan.
In defense of Jorgensen, Republican Sen. Brady Brammer said, “you can take the boy out of Utah, but you can't take Utah out of the boy.”
And Majority Leader Kirk Cullimore said that the residency question has been looked into by the nominating commission, the governor’s office and the Senate Judicial Confirmation Commission.
“We all feel comfortable that the constitutional requirements have been met,” Cullimore said.
Sen. Emily Buss of the Forward Party said when voting ‘no’ to Jorgensen’s appointment that taxpayers would foot the bill if the residency question is brought to court.
Democratic Sen. Stephanie Pitcher said the minority caucus asked their legal team about this, and said the response they got was, “it’s not possible to predict how a court would rule. Staff did state that it would be helpful to know whether the appointee has held a Utah driver's license, filed his income taxes, or was registered to vote in Utah during the last five years.”
Some Democrats voted ‘no’ on both Dent and Jorgensen because neither attorney has been a judge before. There have been Utah and U.S. Supreme Court justices throughout history who were also first-time judges. Additionally, Sens. Karen Kwan and Jen Plumb said they weren’t as impressed as they wanted to be by Dent’s answers and experiences.
Brammer said the Utah Constitution doesn’t require judicial experience. To colleagues, he said he hopes “we can measure these people for what they do bring, as opposed to a made-up qualification that is helpful but not essential to this job.”
Co-Equal Utah, a nonpartisan group led by attorneys that say they’re focused on protecting the judiciary from political interference, has also expressed concerns about the lack of experience.
Dent is currently a federal prosecutor in southern Utah.
Both Dent and Jorgensen repeatedly said that their judicial philosophies are “originalism” and “textualism,” which are especially popular in conservative legal circles and match Cox’s stated judicial philosophy. Jorgensen defined both approaches as respecting the intent of those who wrote the Constitution and wrote laws.
After being confirmed, Jorgensen told lawmakers, “I'm going to read the words that you wrote.”
When asked, both new justices said in their confirmation hearings that there is a difference between those philosophies and conservatism. The latter, Dent said, is a political view focused on outcomes, while originalism and textualism interpret the words of the law without regard for outcome.
There will be more changes to the Utah Supreme Court in the coming months.
In addition to the Legislature’s expansion, Justice Diana Hagen resigned earlier this year as Republican lawmakers looked to investigate her for allegations that the Judicial Conduct Commission had already dismissed. And Chief Justice Matthew Durrant will retire at the end of August.
That means Gov. Cox has two more justices to appoint. After that happens, all but one of the seven justices on the state’s highest court will have been appointed by Cox.
Jorgensen and Dent are expected to start within the next month, depending on how much time they need to wrap up their current jobs, according to a court spokesperson.
Physical construction of the Utah Supreme Court chambers is underway to accommodate the two new justices. A court spokesperson said it is expected to be complete in September, which is when the court usually starts to hear oral arguments.
