The Greater Idaho Movement

If adopted, the Greater Idaho Movement would preserve election results while reducing the influence of each Idahoan in both general elections and party primaries.

The Greater Idaho Movement is the proposal to move the Idaho border to enclose the eastern half of Oregon, where the majority of the population claims to align itself more with the political views of Idaho citizens than with western Oregonians. Many citizens in rural eastern Oregon are enthusiastic about the idea, and Idaho’s citizens and legislators have shown openness to the plan. 

Currently, the leaders of the Greater Idaho Movement are proposing that Idaho adopt seventeen counties, which in total contain more than 400,000 registered voters. This would increase the number of registered voters in Idaho by almost 30 percent.

Perhaps the most overlooked consequence of this within the Idaho citizens’ sphere is the effect on the individual’s voting power. 

In the 2022 state elections, 500,000 Idahoans cast ballots to choose a state governor. The Greater Idaho Movement would add to this number the 250,000 ballots cast by eastern Oregonians for their own governor. Each Idahoan’s vote would go from roughly one in 500,000 to one in 750,000.

In other words, if the Greater Idaho Movement were adopted, each Idahoan’s vote would lose about 30 percent of its current power in general elections.

This is especially relevant to independent voters, who can only participate in general elections and are excluded from Idaho’s closed party primaries.

A similar effect can be predicted within party primaries, including the Republican Party, where the most consequential elections take place for Idaho. In 2022, around 280,000 ballots were cast for state governor in the Idaho Republican primaries. Eastern Oregon Republicans cast 75,000 ballots. 

Adding these together decreases each Idaho Republican’s voting power by about 21 percent.

Despite this decrease in the individual’s influence, the overall election outcomes and the balance between Republicans and Democrats under the Greater Idaho Movement would remain nearly the same. 

The Republican Party is dominant in Idaho by a large margin. In the 2022 governor’s general election, the Republican candidate, Brad Little, won with around 60 percent of the votes. Independent candidate Ammon Bundy gained an unusually high 17 percent of the votes, almost outpacing Democratic candidate’s 20 percent.

In their own election, the eastern Oregon counties voted 57 percent Republican, a very close percentage to Idaho’s election, though with significantly higher Democratic support at about 40 percent. 

The 2020 U.S. Presidential election results were closer, and are perhaps more accurate since the candidates are the same for both states. Compared to Idaho, eastern Oregon had only 6 percent fewer Republican votes and 7 percent more Democrat votes. 

This suggests that, as supporters of the Greater Idaho Movement claim, Idaho and eastern Oregon are nearly in political alignment. Combined, the vote would shift by only a couple percentage points.

This difference is likely due to the inclusion of a couple Democratic-leaning Oregon counties — including the more densely populated county of Deschutes — which are located in the eastern half of the state.

Many of these eastern Oregonians who support the Republicans are not actually registered as Republicans. Oregon has a significantly higher percentage of independents and small party members than Idaho. 

If the registration data, rather than voting behavior, is examined, there is a shift in the political balance. Combining the registered voters would bring Idaho’s percentage of independents from about 25 percent to 28 percent and small party members from 1 percent to 3 percent, which would cause the number of official Republicans to drop from 61 percent to 54 percent. The Democrats would rise only from 12 percent to 15 percent.

With the small decrease in the margin between Democrats and Republicans, and the increase in independents and small party members, would this mean that voters outside the main parties might have a larger role in elections?

There is one factor here that is difficult to account for. Many small parties recognized in Oregon are not recognized in Idaho. It remains to be seen how exactly this will be handled as eastern Oregonians are merged into Idaho’s voting system. 

It is highly unlikely, given Idaho’s higher bar for party recognition, that any small party from Oregon would immediately be recognized in Idaho. One simple solution is that these members will automatically become independent and then be given the choice to join any of Idaho’s already recognized parties.

In both the 2020 and 2022 elections, a higher percentage of Idahoans voted for independent and small party candidates. Eastern Oregon’s votes for Republican candidates nearly matched Idaho’s.

Given the behavioral alignment eastern Oregon has with Republicans, it is plausible that many eastern Oregon independents and small party members will join the Idaho Republican Party. 

For a more precise analysis, assume that all eastern Oregon independents remain independent and all small party members either become independent or join a small Idaho party. 

Hypothetically, if Idaho and eastern Oregon’s combined independents and small party members voted unanimously for a single candidate, their votes would comprise about 32 percent of the ballots. The Republicans would still have 54 percent of the vote.

Even if the independents and small party members combined with the Democrats, the Republicans would still lead by 8 percent.

If their numbers rise and the margin between Democrats and Republicans shrinks, independents and small party voters will gain slightly greater influence in Idaho elections. But even combined, they would be unlikely to outvote the Republican Party.

Both before and after the Greater Idaho Movement, the Republican Party would be clearly dominant in Idaho. It follows that the Idaho Republican primary is the most critical election in the state, as whoever wins within it is nearly guaranteed to also win the general election.

But even if election outcomes are not changed, this would still represent a significant shift for Idahoans. The Idaho border has not been changed so drastically since the creation of Wyoming Territory in 1868. That was more than 150 years ago, before Idaho was even a recognized state. 

And this affects more than just Idaho and Oregon. There have been no major border changes in the continental United States since the close of the 1800s, but the idea is gaining traction across the country.

For a long time, West Coast citizens have proposed that northern California and southern Oregon split from their origins and create the new “State of Jefferson”. More recently, and inspired by the Greater Idaho Movement, West Virginia has proposed to adopt several like-minded counties from Virginia and Maryland. These are only a couple of the countless proposed revision ideas.

Tensions between Republicans and Democrats are cutting through America, but instead of a North and South divide like the Civil War, today the front is between rural conservatives and city-dwelling liberals. As these movements show, many citizens are ready “to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another”.

The people of eastern Oregon are tired of being ignored and governed without their consent. They are demanding real representation, and Idahoans are sympathetic. By opening its doors to the Greater Idaho Movement, Idaho would support a much larger movement pushing governments to respect the will of the governed.

But it could also encourage similar movements in other states, reinforcing cultural differences with political boundaries all across America. The gap between Republican and Democrat, rural and urban, may stretch farther than ever before.

As George Washington said in his Farewell Address, “The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.”

Yet the Greater Idaho Movement would come at a cost. Though election outcomes would remain largely unchanged and political alignment would increase, the influence of the individual Idahoan would decline. And at the same time, the movement may serve as fuel for the growing divides in America.