At first, the ads seemed like a pandemic-era curiosity, a niche political pitch playing on the red state, blue state divide.
“Escape liberal hell,” counseled one sales video from a Boise real estate agent. “Here are seven reasons conservatives flock to Idaho.”
“Time is not on your side, flee the city NOW before the coming collapse!” read another ad for 5 acres in Moyie Springs, Idaho, listed for $259,000 by a company called Black Rifle Real Estate. (Motto: “Ready. Aim. Move.”)
The idea that people would pick up and move solely for politics has seemed like a stretch. Moving for a job, schools, space, a rural lifestyle, yes. People relocate for all sorts of reasons — nearly 250,000 moved here from another U.S. state last year, with 258,000 going the other way, the Census Bureau says.
But now, there’s solid evidence that some people really are migrating over partisanship.
Idaho just released a database of voters who have moved into that state, along with where they came from and what political party they joined when they got there. In Washington, we don’t register by party — everybody is an independent voter. In Idaho, you generally have to affiliate with a party to vote in the primaries, so party choice is right on the government’s registration form.
The political makeup of who has moved to Idaho is eye-opening. It is, as the Idaho Capital Sun news site called it, a “Republican fever dream.”
Of about 119,000 voters who relocated to Idaho in recent years, 65 percent signed up as Republican. That’s significantly higher than the partisan makeup of the state already, which is 58 percent GOP. Only 12 percent of the newcomers registered as Democrats. About 21 percent picked “unaffiliated” and 2 percent chose a third party such as Libertarian.
The data explodes the myth that liberals, untethered due to remote work, might be moving to Idaho or other red states from San Francisco and Seattle and potentially turning the interior more purple. The exact opposite is happening — people are segregating into like-minded, polarized, geographical camps.
Sixty-two percent of Washingtonians who moved to Idaho registered as Republicans, the data shows. Only 12 percent were Democrats. Ours is a 60-40 blue state, roughly, so this means Republicans are preferentially sorting themselves out of Washington at high rates. Red migration like this to the interior is a nightmare for the Washington GOP. Its own customers are fleeing.
What we don’t know is the political bent of people moving into Washington. (Again, we don’t register by party.) Last year, 10,600 Idahoans moved here (versus 14,400 Washingtonians who moved there). Were these 10,600 some of the Gem State’s last Democrats fleeing for more liberal pastures? It’s possible some are running from the same right-wing bent of the state — the abortion ban, for instance — that is luring so many Republicans.
There’s now an entire cottage industry of companies catering to this partisan clustering, especially on the right.
You can now even choose your real estate agent by their politics. The company GOP Agent “is here to help you connect with a Real Estate Agent who shares your Republican ideals and values,” their website says.
I hope they warned them that Idaho has a state income tax. Could be a sticker shock upon arrival.
The Economist magazine speculates that soon there may be entire parallel economies, where Republicans and Democrats not only segregate themselves into disparate land masses but drink different coffee brands and subscribe to separate cellphone providers, based on red or blue tribalism.
Some of the founders warned about the malignant influence of too much partisanship — Alexander Hamilton called it democracy’s “most fatal disease.” And now we’re choosing real estate agents and cell networks based on it.
With political foes, it may be tempting to just say “good riddance” when they move out of your town. But the “Parallel States of America” doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.
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