Ethan Morse: I set my chair under my team’s tent. Then the tent moved.

I grew up Mormon and conservative, which is the profile for many Utahns. The beginning of 2020 marked the time I began to give serious attention to politics and determine whom I was planning to vote for. To me, voting for the Republican Party was the best way to support my values and guide our country in a better direction.

Then I started listening.

I listened to President Donald Trump talking about the incoming pandemic and heard him say “You’re a terrible reporter” when someone asked what the president’s message was for families who were scared. That seemed out of character from the conservative party I grew up with.

Maybe Trump was having a bad day. I brushed it off. I then learned, as many who have been paying attention know, that this behavior was more normal than not.

I listened to Joe Biden give a speech after he was confirmed to be the Democratic presidential nominee. I was planning to justify what I saw as my mandate to vote Republican. Logically, Democrats must be bad if we need a guy like Trump leading us.

What I didn’t expect was to hear was well-put-together sentences from someone I heard was too old for office. I didn’t expect to hear the phrase “As God’s children each of us have a purpose in our lives.” That is something I would expect to hear in General Conference. What I ultimately didn’t expect to hear was hope, something that seemed all but gone in the darkest parts of 2020.

So, what happened? Have I inadvertently become a raging liberal? Was I going to be banished from my conservative community? Does anyone else feel this way, that the values I grew up attributing to the Republican Party were no longer there? Maybe, no, and definitely.

I look at this conundrum like a sporting event. Both team’s fans are sitting side by side, under their own tents to shield us from the sun. Blue team on the left; Red team on the right. I sat my chair down toward the leftward side of the Red tent. Suddenly, the tent was picked up and moved several feet to the right, leaving me and a few others in the blazing sun. Those who have been under the tent longer might say that the shift happened more gradually, but the feeling of being tentless and exposed is the same.

Now what? Do we follow the tent into even more extreme territory, still taking refuge under the tent we’re familiar with who’s fans and leaders have become unrecognizable?

Sen. Mitt Romney characterized this sentiment last week when he stated we have strayed from that party we used to be. Can we stay in the party and move it back to its rightful place?

Should we follow the advice of Evan McMullin and form our own conservative party? Do we follow some members of The Lincoln Project, an anti-Trumpism conservative media group, and join the Democratic Party? The right side of the Blue tent may look closer than the left side of the Red one, and they’ve been welcoming so far.

I’m not expecting a majority of Utahns to leave the Republican Party. Clearly, I’m naïve but not that naïve. Political races are won on the margins, and there is a growing conservative minority in the Republican Party. These people are becoming marginalized as the party becomes more and more extreme. Wherever we all end up, my hope is that 2020 becomes the year all of us pay a little more attention to who’s running and what issues really matter to us.

Ethan Morse, Salt Lake City, is CEO of Morse Media and a student at Utah Valley University.