A letter to Senator Curtis

A few years ago I had the pleasure of taking now-Utah Senator John Curtis on a snowy day-after-Christmas hike on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail on the flanks of Salt Lake’s Mount Olympus and – as it turns out – very near where Senator Curtis grew up. We were discussing the potential Wilderness retraction of the sections of the trail that were “Wilderness” (despite the noise of I-215 a few hundred feet below us) to enable mountain biking on that section. We had a fine outing and a great discussion about our various viewpoints on the concept and reality of Wilderness, and he struck me as a good guy, even as we were pretty opposed to each other on many topics. Later, when he introduced federal legislation that opposed my viewpoint, he had the integrity to reach out to me to kinda apologize and kinda remind me why he did it, which I very much appreciated.

Now John Curtis is our freshman senator, and he is giving his first speech on the floor tomorrow. While Utah’s state legislature and governor and their actions might make it seem that all of Utah is empowered by national rhetoric, the rumble underneath is that even our historical conservative folks are uncomfortable with the current status, and Senator Curtis’s op ed this week in the Deseret News (https://www.deseret.com/opinion/2025/05/04/sen-john-curtis-pilgrimage-to-american-principles/) indicates that he too is “uncomfortable”. He decided to go – alone – to Arlington National Cemetery, Ensign Peak (above the Utah capitol), the Holocaust Museum, and the Museum of African-American history to reflect and think prior to giving his speech to the Senate.

Curtis also asked for feedback, and created a new email address for this moment: experience@curtis.senate.gov. I have sent a couple of notes to Senator Curtis and despite the fact that I thought we were great pals I have gotten his canned responses that were undoubtedly sent by a young enthusiastic staffer (but I have let it go a bit; he’s probably been a bit busy!). But this time – with the specific email addy -I thought perhaps I could break through. So I wrote an email and of course got carried away, and then I thought that it would be an appropriate rant to go along with some fun gallivants that I need to write on.

If you’re a Utahn you should take this opportunity to reach out to him, even if it’s after his speech tomorrow. I think Curtis has the potential to be a transformative guy (he admitted to me that he’s “a closet environmentalist!”) and may have similar Romney-esque guts to perhaps more-strategically subvert some of the social damage being wreaked these days.

Below is my note. Even if he doesn’t get back to me, I am gonna assume that he read it, and indeed, “writing my senator” is literally The Least I Can Do.

Hello Senator Curtis

Tom Diegel here; you and I hiked the Bonneville Shoreline trail Z-trail segment a coupla years ago and have worked together a few times on various Wasatch-related topics.  

I saw your D-news Op-ed and was impressed; it seems that it’s the first time I’ve heard that a Republican is indeed concerned about many of the aspects of potentially-high impact social changes that are being proposed.  And while details like tariff rates and which agencies should cut which programs by how much and which judges and appointees should be approved or rejected are important, I think you are spot on with trying to take a little step back and reflect on some important fundamentals of what it means to not only be a citizen, but more importantly what it takes to lead this country.  

I too have visited the places that by now you have visited, and have my own perspectives that I’d like to share with you.  

• The Holocaust Museum – one of the few museums I’ve visited twice, the Holocaust Museum is profoundly sobering and sad, yet vital.  I remember thinking that no matter how sunny and beautiful DC is when I go inside, it’s dark and pouring rain when I exit, and I can barely speak.   And I have had an overwhelming thought:  “How can this have happened? How could our fellow humans have foresaken their morals and values behind to fear, disdain, subjugate, torture, and murder their fellow citizens?”    Of course “the answer” is complex, but it seems that at its core it’s fear of people who are “different” that results in sliding inexorably down slippery slope down that series of ever-more-draconian list above, and being justified in doing so by leaders who were able to manipulate that fear.  I am very concerned that we are potentially facing a similar situation here in modern America; perhaps not one where people are actually tortured and murdered, but certainly feared, disdained, and subjugated for alternative lifestyles and beliefs, while social leaders encourage this behavior- or at least stand by – for an array of reasons.  But I’m somewhat hopeful that strong leadership can avert this?  
• The African-American Museum – I was of course very moved by that museum as well, and it prompted me to dig more into the African-American history.  I felt a bit sheepish that my only exposure to slavery until fairly recently was seeing “Roots” when I was a kid  -and there were only about 5 Black kids in my 2000+ high school, but after visiting that museum I read a good handful of books and watched another good handful of movies about different aspects of Black history in America, and again was struck by “how could people have done this to other people?” both in terms of slavery and overt discrimination, up to and including these times.  I have learned that our upper/middle class white-based leadership system has made it hard on Blacks and other minorities, and continues to do so by eliminating formalized opportunities for historically underprivileged groups,  passing legislation that threatens hard-won voting rights (like the Utah legislature’s recent manipulation of the popular and successful mail-in balloting process, and a new environment that makes immigrants – both legal and illegal-yet-vital (to agriculture and other low-wage jobs)  – fear for their future and actual safety.  I hope that your visit to the African American Museum was a good reminder of America’s own propensity to subjugate our citizens and the necessity to ease the burden that our society has imposed on Blacks and work on humanely integrating enthusiastic immigrants.  
• Arlington Cemetery – I have not visited Arlington, but  – strangely – I have visited similar sobering cemeteries in Europe full of the graves of WW I and WW II soldiers.  But more saliently, both my father (Pacific) and my uncle served in WW II  (kind of rare for someone of my age).  Both of these men fought and killed enemies in order to provide a safe future for not only the likes of me, but also secure democracies around the world.  It’s true that the US has shouldered much of the responsibility for global democracies and peace in the decades since and in many cases failed miserably, but whining about being a perpetual leader is not the characteristic of a true leader.  Everyone knows that a true leader is one who continues to lead and inspire; this is true for the CEO of a company that sells widgets, and it’s particularly true for country that believes so wholly in the concept of the rights associated with free will and decries the concept of communism and autocracies.  The US has the biggest defense in the world, and if we are living in an era of a global economy then we are certainly also in an era of a global neighborhood.  Please consider this and use your own leadership and senate votes accordingly. 
• Ensign Peak – I have ridden, run, and hiked up Ensign Peak many times, and love it.  As you know, it’s probably the closest and most stark of the long string of intersections of wild, public land and thriving industry.  To the west are the refineries, to the south is the seat of power in Utah and hundreds of thousands of homes full of proud and enthusiastic Utahns, and to the east is City Creek, Grandview Peak, SL Twins, Mounts Van Cott, Wire, and Granduer, Mill Creek Canyon, the rugged and iconic Olympus, Big and Little Cottonwood Canyons that are the ingresses to the mighty – yet very accessible – Wasatch range that is partially guarded by the granite cliffs of Lone Peak.  It’s these mountains and their quality, beauty, proximity, lovely trails, and copious snowfall that literally is the lifeblood of the Salt Lake and Utah Valleys as well as the Wasatch Back.  It needs to be maintained and protected; not overrun with infrastructure nor threatened/degraded by mines.  You told me not to tell anyone your little secret that you are a closet environmentalist, and I – mostly! – kept my promise about that, so I know that you know how valuable public lands are, and not just for their extractive resource value!  Those oil refineries west of Ensign are an eyesore and an archaic reminder of a bygone age of Utah’s resource extraction-dependent past, and I hope that you can find it in your heart to do what you know is right:  protect the public lands from degradation.   Remind your colleagues that Moab and Springdale are thriving today because of enthusiastic tourism and are a far cry from the dusty, boom and bust oil and gas towns of yore.   And please…..instead of letting the BLM and USFS lose their funding and their hard-working, on-the-ground folks go, please allocate yet more resources to these invaluable agencies doing their best to keep up with the ever-intensifying public lands; while it may be true that these folks are part of a large cumbersome DC bureaucracy, they are vital to effective management of the human/lands interaction. 
  

Senator Curtis – you have been discussed as a potentially transformative figure; one who has the background and job security to perhaps buck what appears to be a trend of letting the executive branch subvert the powers of Congress and the will of the people. It seems that you are on the cusp of being yet another senator/congressman who will ultimately feel compelled to apologize or hide because of your fealty to what at least many of your constituents feel are many constitutionally-degrading actions, or being a strategic leader in righting our ship of democracy.  I will watch your speech tomorrow to see which one shows up.  

Sincerely, 

Tom Diegel