Another right-wing county in eastern Oregon has reportedly voted to leave the Democratic-run state and join neighboring Idaho.
Crook County residents passed the measure Tuesday with a 53 percent majority, making the county the 13th county in the state to sign on to the movement known as “Greater Idaho.” NewsNation reported:.
“Eastern Oregon voters have made it clear and vocal that they want to see border negotiations move forward,” said Matt McCaw, executive director of the Greater Idaho Campaign.
“These results in Crook County leave no excuse for the Legislature and Governor to continue ignoring the wishes of our residents.”
In Greater Idaho, more than half of Oregon’s territory would leave the Beaver State and join Republican-controlled Idaho to the east.
The measure would move Idaho’s border 200 miles west, through central Oregon.
Greater Idaho got started in earnest in 2020 and quickly began to gain momentum, and by 2022, 11 of the state’s 36 counties had voted in support of the idea.
This force is driven by the sharp political divide between Oregon’s sparsely populated, rural and conservative interior and liberal coastal cities with population centers such as Portland and Salem, the state capital.
A Greater Idaho would mean Oregon losing two-thirds of its land area but only about 10 percent of its population — a disparity that conservatives in the state feel means laws are being made by people who have nothing to do with their lifestyles or beliefs.
“The Oregon-Idaho border was established 163 years ago and is now outdated,” the movement’s website says. “The current location does not match the location of Oregon’s cultural boundaries, so it doesn’t make sense.”
Greater Idaho aims to include 17 counties in its movement, consisting of all 14 counties and parts of three counties.
Even if the movement gets all the votes it needs, the process won’t be over yet.
To secede, both the Oregon and Idaho state legislatures must approve the bill, followed by the U.S. Congress.
State borders have been redrawn before — Maine separated from Massachusetts in 1820 — but never before has a state seceded from another state to join a large swath of land and people.
