Well-Fed Oregon Counties Get 1 Step Closer to Liberal State Fleeing in Idaho

Have you ever thought about running away from your state without even going a mile?

More than a dozen counties in rural Oregon could declare their independence from the progressive-dominated state and build a new future in Idaho.

Legislation introduced this month in the Oregon Senate proposes that state legislatures and governors in both states begin negotiations to move the border separating Idaho and Oregon.

Symbolic legislation represents a step forward for an untested idea that is more realistic than it might seem.

State boundaries have changed before in accordance with the agreements of the state legislatures, although most of the changes involved minor adjustments to the boundaries of newly admitted former territories.

Article XVI of the Oregon Constitution reserves the power of the Oregon legislature to adjust state lines subject to the approval of the U.S. Congress.

The bill notes that residents of eleven counties in eastern Oregon have already voted to leave the state and join Idaho.

Residents of the conservative region feel threatened by the left-wing authorities operating in the state’s urban coastal centers.

Oregon became associated with anti-fascist riots and militant progressivism, values ​​at odds with the state’s conservative and rural east.

Eastern Oregon is very different. The state’s rural counties voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election in a rebuke to coastal elitist values ​​associated with cities like Portland.

You are more likely to find American flags, pro-military imagery and public displays of Christianity in this part of the state. You can even describe eastern Oregon as a red state—like Idaho in all but name.

Most likely, eastern Oregon would never have agreed to join the state if its inhabitants were deciding their own fate today.

The borders of the state of Oregon were drawn 163 years ago. The state’s rural residents are stuck within the existing boundaries – they are mixed with anti-gun liberals who don’t share their values.

Rural Oregonians have to deal with some of the worst gun laws in the country, thanks to the state’s liberal localities.

Militant Progressives are planning to ban all hunting and fishing in the state in a vote in 2024 — a slap in the face for rural Oregonians who have practiced these crafts for generations.

The proposed restrictions would also apply animal cruelty laws to those who own livestock, thereby threatening to deprive Oregon ranchers of their livelihood if Initiative Petition 13 is implemented—unless they shirk the extremist idea by joining Idaho.

“Eastern Oregonians have begun to view the Oregon government as a threat to the livelihoods, freedoms, and values ​​of their communities,” Oregon Senator Dennis Linticam said in a bill entitled Senate Joint Memorial 2.

A spokesman for the Greater Idaho Movement pointed to rising tensions between coastal Oregon and rural parts of the state.

“Portland voters have enforced gun control measures across the state even though eastern Oregon voters have nearly blocked it,” Greater Idaho’s Matt McCaw said of the division, according to KOIN.

“Grant and Harney counties are ranches, but Portland is not. It makes no sense for these two cultures to dictate politics to each other.”

If anything, the desire of rural Oregonians to join Idaho testifies to the bankruptcy of Oregon’s awakened authoritarianism. Oregon has 36 counties and would lose nearly a third of them if a plan to adjust the boundaries of Greater Idaho was passed.

Oregon is already losing residents without losing its eastern counties to Idaho.

Census data showed that in 2022, the leftist state lost residents for the first time in decades due to crime, unrest and homelessness, which pushed residents to new pastures.

Oregon Senate President Rob Wagner, a Democrat, told KOIN he does not expect the bill to move forward in the state senate.

You’d think the Oregon government would be willing to part ways with all the part of the state that wants to break with them, but Oregon has given every indication that it intends to keep its rural east on a short leash.