SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Utah lawmakers reasserted their commitment to making the state a welcoming place for refugees Wednesday as President Donald Trump crafts a revised travel ban.
Members of a Senate economic development and workforce services committee unanimously backed a resolution expressing the stance during a hearing in which they highlighted their own ancestors’ experience as immigrants.
Proposal sponsor Sen. Brian Shiozawa, R-Cottonwood Heights, said his grandfather moved to the U.S. from Japan as a single man who didn’t speak much English. He said his grandfather soon married and had seven children.
The resolution, which Shiozawa said helps solidify the state’s embrace of diversity, next moves to the full Senate for consideration.
Republican Sen. Jacob Anderegg told committee members that his grandfather was an immigrant, who moved to Utah with his parents from Switzerland after being disowned by their family when they converted to the Mormon church.
“I think we have to strike that balance of protecting our boarders while at the same time recognizing that we’re all immigrants, we’re all decedents of immigrants,” he said. “We can’t exclude some who are desperately in need at the sake of wanting to ensure that we don’t have any people coming here who would have alternative motives.”
Though Trump comfortably won the mostly Republican state, his stance on refugees puts him at odds with the Mormon church and some top leaders such as Gov. Gary Herbert, a Republican.
Utah’s unique political culture, dominated by the Mormon church, puts a premium on personal decency and openness to immigrants and refugees. The embrace of refugees by the religion has roots in the history of the faith, which counted many immigrants among its early members.
Utah receives about 1,200 refugees each year and has a total of about 60,000 in the state.
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This story has been clarified to show that Shiozawa’s grandfather didn’t speak much English.
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