Red vs Blue
A lot of states have a very nearly 50/50 split between reasonable voters across the political spectrum, and Republican death cultists. Who wins an election in most of the USA boils down to a tiny fluctuation in the electorate. There are two significant consequences of this.
First, in places like Texas, where that tiny difference leans ever so slightly in the direction of far-right extremists and would-be fascists, you get state legislators calling for their state to secede (taking with them the nearly 50% of the populace who aren’t overtly delusional death cultists).
Second, in places like Virginia, where that tiny difference leans ever so slightly in the direction of people of good will across the political spectrum, the state is run by well-meaning people, but those people are continually struggling against the nearly 50% of the populace who are death cultists.
Don’t be too proud of the fact that your state veers ever so slightly away from the Republican death cult. In most of the USA, it wouldn’t take much more than a stiff breeze for that to change.
Trump is just a symptom; Republicans are the disease.