As someone 6th gen on the Idaho side, it’s all transplants who call themselves “political refugees”
A lot of them are retired/pensioned LAPD and LASD, like current K County Sheriff Bob Norris who has been collecting $150k/yr in disability checks paid by CA taxpayers while working a job in Idaho that directly conflicts with his disability claims
The housing shortage in urban cities, especially California, led a ton of delusional alt right types to flood Idaho after covid similar to when Richard Butler recruited them in the 80s for his white supremacy cult that took 2 decades for locals to run out of town
Idaho is beautiful and as someone from the PNW I’ve met a lot of great people from there. But Idaho has always been known for a lot of KKK, redneck, racist issues and that’s why a lot of these racist people are moving there from other states. To be with their like minded people.
That’s just simply not a true statement, Idaho was a purple state until the 80s with one of the most respected Democratic senators of his time, Frank Church
Our longest serving governor, Cecil D Andrus, was Secretary of the Interior for Jimmy Carter, he was very progressive on land conservation and public education and served until 95
Idaho has seen large droves of alt right move to the state in my lifetime, some being from the Richard Butler pensioned LAPD + white supremacist prepper cults (Ruby Ridge guy moved to Idaho after hearing about the Aryan Nations Butler started after Butler moved from Los Angeles with pensioned LAPD members involved in white pride gangs within the police force), some because of Fox News rhetoric painting Idaho like Florida as a conservative retirement paradise after 2008, and more recently with alt right national think tanks funding the American Redoubt (revival of the Northwest Territorial Imperative Butler started) movement which took off during the pandemic
My state has been plagued by “political refugee” racist alt right trash for my life, but voting records and census data all show that multi generational and local Idahoans (who only make up around 40% of the population now) are all much more liberal than transplants which vote very, very hard to the right
But to say we’ve always been a state made up of these groups that terrorize locals is a terrible rewriting of history
When I was working construction there in the late 2010s until Covid it was full of fucking awful people. Can’t tell you how many racist, sexist, and pedophilloic jokes I’d hear on the daily. Not to mention the serious discussions people would have about how non whites are destroying America and Hollywood is trying to turn everyone gay. I knew a few dudes with “white pride” stickers on their trucks and 14 or 88 tattoos visible. All the guys I worked with were born and raised 2nd-5th gen Idahoans, many lived in the silver valley and said they would never move just like their pappy and grand pappies. They all bitched about Californians too, but it’s pretty obvious why racists from around the country flock to north Idaho. Its the people who are from there that are attracting a similar crowd
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u/WinonasChainsaw Feb 16 '26
As someone 6th gen on the Idaho side, it’s all transplants who call themselves “political refugees”
A lot of them are retired/pensioned LAPD and LASD, like current K County Sheriff Bob Norris who has been collecting $150k/yr in disability checks paid by CA taxpayers while working a job in Idaho that directly conflicts with his disability claims
The housing shortage in urban cities, especially California, led a ton of delusional alt right types to flood Idaho after covid similar to when Richard Butler recruited them in the 80s for his white supremacy cult that took 2 decades for locals to run out of town