In a bid to select their preferred presidential candidate, Utah Republicans turned to their biennial neighborhood caucus meetings, foregoing the state-run Super Tuesday primary election this year. However, the decision seems to have backfired, as the turnout for the 2024 primary appeared much lower than in previous years, even during another chaotic caucus night.

The state GOP's attempt to run the election was marred by technological problems and upset voters. Attendees were encouraged to pre-register on the party's website, but the system encountered difficulties, leading to long lines and confusion at various caucus locations. Results were finally released around midnight, hours after the Democrats.

According to early returns, President Joe Biden secured an overwhelming victory in Utah's Democratic primary, capturing about 88% of the vote. On the Republican side, former President Donald Trump garnered 57% of the caucusgoers' votes.

Many frustrated Republicans voiced their discontent with the chaotic caucus process. Some complained of being shuffled between multiple caucus locations throughout the night, causing substantial disruptions to their evening.

GOP chair Rob Axson, however, expressed gratitude towards the candidates, organizers, volunteers, and caucus-goers, acknowledging the challenges they faced during the event. The party's decision to hold a presidential preference poll at the caucus meetings echoes a similar scenario from 2016 when the Utah GOP opted for a party-run caucus, prompting Utah Democrats to follow suit due to a lack of funding for a primary election.

The 2016 caucus was not without its problems either. Alongside the inclement weather that forced attendees to wait outside for hours, a disastrous experiment with online voting left approximately 40,000 voters unable to cast their online ballots because their voter registration status could not be verified. The Utah GOP struggled to tally the online votes, delaying the release of the final results by over a month.

The choice to use Smartmatic, a London-based election technology company, for the online portion of the 2016 primary has since been mired in controversy, with Smartmatic suing Fox News for $2.7 billion in damages for spreading baseless conspiracy theories regarding Donald Trump's 2020 election loss.

Former GOP chairman Carson Jorgensen empathized with the challenges faced on Tuesday night, given the unconventional nature of a presidential preference poll at neighborhood meetings. He noted that although Republicans worked hard to promote the event, many people in his town were unaware of what was happening, despite being major Trump supporters.

In terms of finances, Utah Republicans reportedly received $300,000 from the six Republican candidates who appeared on the state GOP ballot, with each campaign paying $50,000 for the privilege. In contrast, the five Democratic candidates paid a $500 fee to the state when filing to run.

As of Wednesday morning, the tally for the Democratic primary stood at just over 61,000 ballots counted, accounting for around 27% of the registered Democratic voters in Utah. On the Republican side, approximately 8% of the state's 890,600 active Republican voters had their ballots counted from the Super Tuesday caucus.

Efforts to eliminate Utah's universal vote-by-mail system, largely fueled by former President Trump's unsubstantiated claims of widespread fraud, have been met with resistance. Proposed legislation in 2022 to replace the system with same-day, in-person voting was rejected by a legislative committee, while a bill requiring voters to opt-in to receive their ballots by mail failed without further discussion this year. A citizen initiative in 2020 seeking to scrap vote-by-mail for in-person voting also fell short of the required signatures.

In light of the considerable challenges presented by the Utah Republican primary this year, discussions surrounding potential changes to the voting system are expected to continue, although the status quo appears to remain largely intact for now.