One-on-one with Utah Governor Spencer Cox

Up First from NPR

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Daily News, News

4.5 • 52.8K Ratings

🗓️ 25 November 2025

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

After the right-wing activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated, Utah Governor Spencer Cox called for civility. Steve Inskeep spoke to him at a meeting of the Western Governors' Association.

The full video of our interview with the governor is on npr.org and on YouTube.

This bonus episode of Up First was edited by Arezou Rezvani. It was produced by Taylor Haney and Julie Depenbrock. We got engineering support from Jimmy Keeley. Our executive producer is Jay Shaylor.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Spencer Cox is comfortable bringing his faith to politics.
0:05.0	Here's what makes him uncomfortable.
0:07.0	Politics is replacing religion.
0:09.0	If I don't have any real friends, at least we can hate the same people together on Facebook or TikTok.
0:14.0	One diagnosis of a divided nation on a special edition of Up First from NPR News.
0:19.0	Utah's Republican governor wants to clyne to vote for Donald Trump. of Up First from NPR News.
0:24.6	Utah's Republican governor wants to decline to vote for Donald Trump.
0:28.2	He then endorsed Trump, urging him to unify the country.
0:29.0	Has he?
0:31.7	I think if you were to ask him that question, he would say no.
0:36.0	Also, Cox supports nuclear power to drive AI data centers.
0:37.7	But what are the downsides?
0:39.2	Plumbers are going to do great.
0:41.4	Attorneys are going to do very poorly.
0:45.2	And we've never had that kind of technological disruption.
0:46.0	Stay with us.
0:52.7	We have a conversation with Utah Governor Spencer Cox on a special edition of Up First from NPR News.
1:07.1	Spencer Cox is the governor of Utah where the activist Charlie Kirk was murdered in September.
1:11.0	Please, gentlemen. I get the microphone.
1:15.2	Cox gave an update on the investigation and then said a little more.
1:21.1	Over the last 48 hours, I have been as angry as I have ever been.
1:24.5	As sad as I have ever been.
	...

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