Utah News Dispatch
As the legislative session ends, a beloved Utah couple turns a new page
House sergeant-at-arms Mike Mitchell and his wife, Karen Mitchell, who is a receptionist in the House offices, pose for a photo together at the Capitol in Salt Lake City on the final night of the legislative session, Friday, March 6, 2026. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)
A chapter of public service in a Utah couple’s 64-year love story came to a close when lawmakers adjourned Friday at midnight and the pair commuted home from the Capitol for the last time.
Karen Mitchell, a receptionist for the House of Representatives, and Mike Mitchell, the House sergeant-at-arms, both 82, are retiring this year after two decades working in tandem.
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They’ve had a close-up view of state politics playing out in the House, in whispers at its threshold and behind office closed doors. Their shared tenure spanned six House speakers and exponential turnover in representatives, staffers and interns. Many didn’t know the Mitchells were a long-running item, but some registered that the receptionist had an admirer.
About 20 paces separated her desk from her husband’s post at the entrance to the House floor, but so did a door. When he made a ritual out of bringing her a soda and chatting in the afternoons, legislative interns took notice.
“They really thought we were having an affair,” Mike Mitchell said Friday with a glint in his eye. “You wouldn’t believe how many reps have thought that, too.”
The couple smiled as they recalled arriving together at a recent dinner with lawmakers, to the astonishment of Rep. Ken Ivory, R-West Jordan.
“We sat at the table, and Ivory’s eyes about fell out of his head. He said, ‘You know her?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I’ve been dating her for a little while,’” Mike Mitchell said.
The pair met in 1962 at a credit union in Salt Lake City where she worked and he applied for a loan. He was shy. She suggested a date.
They went on to have five children,15 grandchildren and 23 great grandchildren. She is their household’s head of finance, while he does laundry and cooks family dinners, along with feasts for their ward, a local congregation of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The couple declined to discuss their political leanings but divulged a car-ride covenant. On the way home to Midvale during the legislative session, they traded notes on the day’s debates and the lawmakers and visitors who came and went. While on the job, they said they’ve taken care to stay neutral and treat people of all political stripes with respect.
“It doesn’t matter who they are, where they’re from,” Karen Mitchell said.
Mike Mitchell began working at the Capitol in 1998 after asking Mel Brown, the former Utah House Speaker and their neighbor, about ideas for staying busy in the wintertime.
His wife joined him eight years later, working at the Capitol as a legislative committee secretary before becoming a full-time receptionist. They had retired from earlier careers, she as a high school principal’s secretary and he as head of maintenance for Salt Lake County parks.
For the last 20 years, he was House sergeant-at-arms, acting at times as an assistant to the speaker and overseeing the chamber’s “green coats” — now a force of 16 employees that are part security guard and part docent, with a dress code requiring an emerald sport coat.
His health took a sharp turn over the summer when he was diagnosed with bladder cancer and underwent a six-hour emergency surgery. His wife said the 2026 legislative session helped motivate him to recover.
“He could have given up,” she said.
To their surprise, the Mitchells received an exuberant standing ovation from representatives on the House floor last Tuesday. House Speaker Mike Schultz honored their work with a legislative citation, beaming as he praised their decades of service.
“All of us have been such great recipients of their friendship,their love, their warmth, their smile every day,” said Schultz, R-Hooper.
Mike Mitchell’s retirement began Saturday. Karen Mitchell will stay on a few more months to wrap up her work on the House journal, a record of the body’s official business. The couple spoke of plans to visit family in St. George and points beyond, and of revving up their part-time landscaping and catering businesses.
“I would have kept on working, but she says, ‘This is it for me,’ Mike Mitchell revealed. I said, ‘Well, I guess I better quit, too.’”
Said Karen Mitchell: “It really is time.”
