Utah State Senate elections, 2010

2010 State senate elections
	AL • AK • AR • AR • CA • CO • CT • DE • FL • GA • HI • ID • IL • IN • IA • KY • ME • MD • MA • MI • MN • MO • MT • NE • NV • NH • NY • NC • ND • OH • OK • OR • PA • RI • SD • TN • TX • UT • VT • WA • WV • WI • WY
Parties with candidates
Impact of term limits
Successful challengers
Defeated incumbents
State house elections
State senate elections
State legislative elections

	2012 → ← 2008
	Utah State House elections, 2010
	Majority control • Campaign contributions
	Qualifications • Competitiveness analysis
	State Legislative Election Results
	List of candidates District 2 • District 3 • District 4 • District 5 • District 7 • District 9 • District 11 • District 12 • District 15 • District 17 • District 18 • District 21 • District 22 • District 26 • District 28
	Utah State Senate; State legislative elections, 2010

Utah State Senate elections were held in 15 of the Utah's 29 senate districts on November 2, 2010. The 15 districts where electoral contests took place in 2010 were: 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 12, 15, 17, 18, 21, 22, 26, and 28 .

The signature filing deadline for candidates wishing to run in this election was March 19, 2010, and the primary election day was June 22, 2010.

Utah's state senators are elected to a four-year term that begins on the first day of January following a November election.

The incumbent senator ran for re-election in 13 of the 15 state senate seats that were up for re-election in 2010.

In the 2010 elections, Republicans gained one seat and retained a majority in the chamber.

November 2 General Election Results

The following candidates won election on November 2, 2010:

Majority control

See also: Partisan composition of state senates

Heading into the November 2 election, the Republican Party held the majority in the Utah State Senate:

Utah State Senate
Party		As of November 1, 2010	After the 2010 Election
	Democratic Party	8	7
	Republican Party	21	22
Total		29	29

Campaign contributions

See also: State-by-state comparison of donations to state senate campaigns

This chart shows how many candidates ran for state senate in Utah in past years and the cumulative amount of dollars raised in state senate races, including contributions in both primary and general election contests. All figures come from Follow The Money.^[1]

Year	Number of candidates	Total contributions
2010	39	$1,612,394
2008	71	$2,432,680
2006	60	$2,241,882
2004	71	$1,336,110
2002	34	$935,931

In 2010, the candidates for state senate raised a total of $1,612,394 in campaign contributions. The top 10 donors were:^[2]

Donor	Amount
Utah Association of Realtors	$84,000
Senate Republican Campaign Cmte of Utah	$83,315
2006 Mayne Candidate Account	$60,248
Utah State Senate Democrats	$46,000
Sorensen, Beverly T	$39,500
Utah Republican Party	$37,453
Comcast	$32,050
Reagan Outdoor Advertising	$31,487
Workers Compensation Fund of Utah	$30,950
Consumer Lending Alliance	$25,500

Incumbency

Unopposed incumbents

All incumbents (100%) faced competition in the November 2 general election.

Primary challenges

3 incumbents (21.4%) faced competition in the June 22 primary. No incumbents lost to their challengers in the primary election.

Retiring incumbents

One incumbent representative did not run for re-election, while 14 (93%) ran for re-election. The one incumbent that did not run for re-election was a Republican:

District 18: Incumbent Republican Jon J. Greiner.

Qualifications

To be eligible to serve in the Utah State Senate, a candidate must be:^[3]

A U.S. citizen at the time of filing
25 years old at the filing deadline time
A three-year resident of Utah at the filing deadline time
A resident for 6 months of the senate district from which elected at the filing deadline time
No person holding any public office of profit or trust under authority of the United States, or of this State, can be a member of the state senate, provided, that appointments in the State Militia, and the offices of notary public, justice of the peace, United States commissioner, and postmaster of the fourth class, shall not, within the meaning of this section, be considered offices of profit or trust.
A qualified voter. A qualified voter is someone who is:

* A U.S. citizen

* A resident of Utah for at least 30 days prior to the next election

* At least 18 years old by the next election

* His or her principal place of residence is in a specific voting precinct in Utah.

List of candidates

District 2

Note: Scott McCoy occupied the District 2 senate seat until his resignation in December 2009.^[4]

June 22 Democratic primary:

Ben McAdams. (D) a Incumbent Democrat McAdams replaced Scott McCoy in the District 2 seat in 2010.

June 22 Republican primary:

Nancie Lee Davis (R) a

Note: Davis was disqualified after failing to file a financial disclosure and was replaced in the race by Melvin Nimer.

November 2 General election candidates:

Ben McAdams 13,663

Melvin Nimer 4,863

District 3

June 22 Democratic primary:

Gene Davis. (D) a Incumbent Davis, a Democrat, was first elected to the 3rd District in 1998.

June 22 Republican primary:

Lee Brinton (R) a

November 2 General election candidates:

Gene Davis 9,396

Lee Brinton 9,190

District 4

June 22 Democratic primary:

Patricia Jones. (D) a Democratic candidate Jones, the incumbent, was first elected to the 4th District in 2006.

June 22 Republican primary:

Doug Greer (R) a
Dana Jenkins (R) (Filed, but withdrew from contest before primary)
Steve C Sorenson (R) (Filed, but withdrew from contest before primary)

November 2 General election candidates:

Patricia Jones 15,189

Doug Greer 11,783

District 5

June 22 Democratic primary:

Karen Mayne. (D) a Incumbent Democrat Mayne joined the Utah Senate in 2009.

June 22 Republican primary:

Samuel Fidler (R) a

Constitution Party candidate:

Jim Peverelle, Jr (C)

November 2 General election candidates:

Karen Mayne 8,492

Samuel Fidler 4,705

Jim Peverelle, Jr 499

District 7

June 22 Democratic primary:

Ross I. Romero. (D) a Incumbent Democrat Romero was first elected to the state senate in 2006.

June 22 Republican primary:

Eric K Johnson (R) a

November 2 General election candidates:

Ross I. Romero 19,596

Eric K Johnson 9,666

District 9

June 22 Democratic primary:

Tyler Ayres (D) a
C B Stirling (D)

June 22 Republican primary:

Wayne Niederhauser. (R) a Incumbent Republican Niederhauser was first elected to the state senate in 2006, after serving briefly as an appointee in the senate.

November 2 General election candidates:

Tyler Ayres 8,398

Wayne Niederhauser 17,243