Comedian Jon Stewart has some questions for Utah's governor

Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Utah Gov. Spencer Cox appeared on "The Daily Show" to discuss his new book "Off Ramp" on peacemaking with host Jon Stewart.
• Stewart challenged Cox on discerning "contemptible" actions, referencing Sen. Mike Lee's controversial tweets. Cox emphasized face-to-face debates without abandoning principles, despite disagreements.
• Despite skepticism, Stewart appreciated Cox's good faith discussions and recommended "Off Ramp" as a fascinating read.

SALT LAKE CITY — When Utah Gov. Spencer Cox appeared on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" Tuesday evening to promote his new book on peacemaking, longtime host Jon Stewart had some pointed questions for the Republican governor.

Cox appeared in studio in New York City on the day of the launch of his new book, "Off Ramp: How to Be a Peacemaker in an Age of Contempt." Completed in the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk in Orem a year ago Thursday, the book chronicles moments in Cox's political and personal life and lays out solutions for improving political dialogue.

Stewart, a liberal-leaning host who is known for frequently skewering conservatives in his weekly monologues, didn't appear to be buying what the governor had to say.

"Let me make an argument for contempt. The reverse," Stewart said. "I have found in my experience that ... you have to be able to discern things that are contemptible. There are things that are contemptible. How do you reckon that we address that? Is the idea that we just acquiesce to the contemptible?"

Using one of the pieces of advice his book offers, Cox responded: "Tell me more about why you feel this way."

Stewart pointed to Sen. Mike Lee, the longtime Utah Republican who posted apparent jokes about the killing of a Minnesota lawmaker and her husband last year. The posts have since been deleted.

"If you can't call something truly contemptible and treat is as such and have society agree to that, why would we have to acquiesce to that?" the comedian asked. "That's all. I'm curious, truly, and I mean that. This, I think, is a good conversation to have about it."

Cox said his book wasn't making the case that one should not find things contemptible.

"I find lots of things contemptible, and you've given some examples of that," he said. "That tweet was contemptible. We should all stand up and say, 'That's not OK. We don't support that.'"

But Cox said his book is making the case for "having this debate face-to-face" despite disagreeing, not for abandoning principles or simply "being nice to each other."

The host also questioned what exactly Cox had done or changed in order to get President Donald Trump to back a request for $1 billion to help protect the Great Salt Lake.

"So, the Republican governor of Utah was able through this peacemaking to get the Republican president to get him water?" Stewart quipped.

Cox said he was concerned that saving the lake would seem to some Republicans like more of a liberal issue.

"I was very worried that Republicans would just see this as kind of a climate change, you know, leftist idea," he said. "If the environmental community supports it, then we're opposed to it, right? And this was us trying to bring those two together to work on this issue."

Stewart poked fun at Utah during the interview with Cox, though he admitted he hasn't visited the Beehive State "in a while."

"I went through there and I was like, 'Can a brother get a cup of coffee in this town?'" he said. "And that was it. I was done."

The governor reassured Stewart he can get Starbucks if he visits again: "There's one there now."

Skeptical though he may have seemed, Stewart thanked Cox for "having these conversations in good faith and good spirit" and recommended viewers read "Off Ramp" — what he called "an interesting read" and "a fascinating book."

"We need more good faith argumentation," Stewart said. "And that includes being able to discern the contemptible and to discern when things are being weaponized in the opposite direction."

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.

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Bridger Beal-Cvetko

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Bridger Beal-Cvetko is a reporter for KSL. He covers politics, Salt Lake County communities and breaking news. Bridger has worked for the Deseret News and graduated from Utah Valley University.