Margaret Woolley Busse was appointed by Governor Spencer Cox in January 2021 to serve as a member of his cabinet as the Executive Director of Utah’s Department of Commerce. With an MBA from Harvard University and degrees in public policy and economics from Brigham Young University, Ms. Busse brings a wealth of experience in public service, social impact, and strategy consulting to her role.
Ms. Busse is passionate about bringing trust back to technology, as it is crucial for Utah’s economy to thrive. Under her leadership, with direction from Governor Cox, the Department of Commerce has played a key role in holding social media platforms accountable for their harm to minors by helping to craft appropriate legislative measures and by filing lawsuits on behalf of the State of Utah against TikTok, Meta, and Snap. In the emerging field of artificial intelligence, Ms. Busse, in partnership with the Utah legislature, has driven forward an innovative approach to AI, which includes the creation of the Office of Artificial Intelligence Policy, which is tasked with both providing regulatory relief to qualifying AI-focused companies and making regulatory policy recommendations through its policy learning lab. This new office enables Utah to encourage innovation, protect the public, and proactively observe and learn when it comes to the substantial new powers of AI. Through the work of this new office, Utah’s legislators passed a groundbreaking law that both creates guardrails and an innovation pathway for mental health chatbots. Ms. Busse also worked with Utah’s legislature to pass the Utah Digital Choice Act–the first of its kind in the nation–to enable users to fully control and move their data seamlessly amongst social media platforms.
As the head of Utah’s chief regulatory agency, Ms. Busse has worked to significantly reduce regulatory fees, streamline the regulatory process, and reform occupational licensing, including in behavioral health in order to dramatically increase the behavioral health workforce needed to help address Utah’s mental health crisis. She is also leading efforts to create streamlined pathways for foreign-credentialed immigrants and refugees in Utah to obtain professional licenses, enabling them to work at their trained skill level here in Utah..
Ms Busse has been named a Most Influential Woman by Utah Business Magazine, received the Cyber Pioneer Award from the Utah Bar Association, was featured on the AI Women Power List, was a Utah Women in Tech award finalist, and received RevRoad’s Championing Women in Business award. Ms. Busse is a Utah native, and she and her husband, Franz, have five children, ages 12 to 22. Her passion for public service began with many years of leadership roles in local government.
