This country may be more politically divided than ever before when you read about conservatives moving to red states and liberals moving to blue states.

The Associated Press reported about Tim Kohl and his wife, Jennifer, moving from Los Angeles to a Boise suburb in Idaho last year.

Kohl, a newly retired Los Angeles police officer, flew a U.S. flag and a Thin Blue Line banner representing law enforcement outside his Boise house. It was something the couple never dared to do before.

“We were scared to put it up,” Jennifer Kohl acknowledged. But The AP said the Kohls knew they had moved to the right place when their Boise neighbors complimented him on the display.

Leah Dean had a different experience. She had been scared to fly an abortion rights banner outside her house in Texas. About the time the Kohls were moving, Dean and her partner found a place in Denver, where their LGBTQ+ pride flag flies above the banner in front of their house.

Like the Kohls, Dean said, “One thing we have really found is a place to feel comfortable being ourselves.”

After reading about those experiences, I decided to do some checking to see other evidence of how divided this country might be. Ballotpedia, the digital encyclopedia of American politics and elections, had the answers I was seeking.

When one political party holds majorities in both chambers of its state legislature and the governor’s office, it’s called a state government trifecta. As of Monday, there were 22 states with a Republican trifecta, 17 states with a Democratic trifecta and 11 divided governments.

Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards is a Democrat and Republicans control both houses of the Legislature, so this  state is one of those 11 divided governments.

States with Republican trifectas are Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas,  Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

The Democratic trifecta states are California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Washington.

Besides Louisiana, the other divided government states are Alaska, Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

Another statistic that proves the country’s division is strong is the fact that  as a result of the 2022 midterm elections, there were 39 trifectas across the country. That was more trifectas than at any other point from 1992 to 2022.

Then, there are the population numbers. The country’s population as of January 2023 was 328,771,307. People living in the 17  Democratic trifecta states number 136,955,272 (41.7%). Those in the Republican trifecta states number 130,058,201 (39.6%). There are only 61,757,834 people living in the divided government states (18.8%).

The AP said the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 created a class of mobile workers no longer bound to the states where their companies were based. Those who are now mobile are predominantly white-collar workers and retirees, the two most politically engaged parts of the national population.

The owner of a realty firm in Denver said politics has become the top issue for people buying a home. “It’s brought up in our initial conversations,” he said. “Three years ago, we didn’t have those conversations, ever.”

A political scientist at Colorado State University-Pueblo said, “Democrats want to live in places with artistic culture and craft breweries, and Republicans want to move to places where they can have a big yard.”

Remember the “Underground Railroad” that helped slaves escape? The AP said there is a “rainbow underground railroad” in Texas run by a Dallas Realtor who helps LGBTQ+ families flee the state’s increased restrictions targeting that population.

The Louisiana Legislature has passed three anti-LGBTQ+ bills that Gov. Edwards vetoed. Republicans who control both the House and Senate are  expected to hold a veto session aimed at overriding those vetoes.

The AP said businesses catering to conservatives fleeing blue states have sprouted, such as Blue Line Moving, which markets to families fleeing from blue states to Florida.

Our founding fathers found ways to compromise when they wrote the U.S. Constitution. Unfortunately, too many Americans in these times are no longer able to work together or communicate peacefully with one another.

We can only hope there will be a great awakening in this country that can erase so much bitterness that exists. Patrick Henry had it right when he said, “Let us trust God and our better judgment to set us right hereafter. United we stand, divided we fall.”