(NewsNation) — Utah, the home of the Golden Spike that united America by rail, is far from united politically.
Sure, it’s solid red, but it’s a great place to examine the “Great Republican Divide.”
Many of the state’s 900,000 registered Republicans, 52.7%, fall all across the political spectrum. From new California transplants in the south who skew right to the more moderate supporters of GOP Gov. Spencer Cox, who won his June 25 gubernatorial primary over his Donald Trump-endorsed candidate, the GOP electorate is hardly in lockstep.
They disagree about foreign policy, election integrity and, of course, the former president and Republican nominee.
In Republican Utah, you’d have to turn back the clock 60 years to find the last time Utah voted to send a Democrat to the White House.
However, there’s quite a political story playing out here among the party faithful.
NewsNation went to a gathering of a group of Utah Republicans over a light supper in Salt Lake City on “Pioneer Day” to talk about the state of their party. The state holiday marks the summer day in 1847 when members of the Church of Latter-day Saints settled the Salt Lake Valley.
“The word RINO, right? I’m sure it has been flung at each of us at some point,” Kyle Friant said.
Meanwhile, another Utah resident, Colleen Carrasco, said she’s voting for Trump because of the “fundamental ideologies that are, to me, at stake.”
While Trump is still expected to win the state, he’s stumbled in Utah.
“He made it more okay to be angry and to isolate certain people and to start conversations not on policy, but on who a person is,” Elizabeth Rasmussen said.
If she had to choose, Rasmussen said she would “vote for (Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala) Harris because I do not trust Trump’s record.”
Emily Bastian says she disliked Trump’s “whole ideology” as well as how he treats others.
“I think at the time, a lot of it was that religious side of me too was this is not how you treat people,” Bastian said.
One Utah man, Garth Gatrell, said neither of the two major candidates meets his criteria. Friant says he plans on writing someone in but hasn’t decided who.
“I don’t want to reward either party because I think they put up their absolute worst this year,” Friant said.
Members of the area’s dominant faith, the Church of Latter-day Saints, consider their spiritual compass a guide to all aspects of life.
Former Republican state lawmaker Becky Edwards has put her understanding of Utah’s history and culture together to form a governing group with the goal of helping good community members become great candidates.
“This is kind of my homage to my women ancestors who were pioneers,” she said.
Edwards said that the political division present today tears apart the “fabric of our communities and our families.”
That’s why she wants to see “civil and thoughtful and productive leaders that come from the roots of their community and really change and flip on its head the type of political dialogue that we see here in Utah.”
“We want to lead out on this,” she said.
