Seems to be just another way of saying the state is going Bluer.

Donald Trump’s time in office ended with more North Carolina Republicans leaving the party than in any other month in his presidency.

The Capitol riot that broke out after Trump’s speech on Jan. 6 led some North Carolina Republicans on a march of their own. But they went to the NC State Board of Elections to change their party affiliations.

Kimrey Rhinehardt, a Chatham County resident, former Capitol Hill staffer and Republican for the last 28 years, is one of those people.

“I didn’t leave the party,” Rhinehardt said. “The party left me. My belief system and my values remain unchanged.”

In just over two weeks, from Jan. 7 to Jan. 22, according to data from the elections board, 59% of 10,766 changes to voter registration came from Republicans re-registering as unaffiliated, as Rhinehardt did. Of that 59%, 40% came from the six, mostly urban counties of Cabarrus, Durham, Guilford, Mecklenburg, Orange and Wake. Those counties comprise only 24% of the state’s registered Republicans.

In all, Republicans lost 5,855 voters during that time period. Democrats gave up only 210 voters.

The closest the Republican Party had come to that size of a loss was April 2018, when 28% of the monthly changes were Republican voters who switched to unaffiliated. It was that week that former FBI Director James Comey said Trump did not deserve to be impeached but was “morally unfit” to be president. Trump is the first U.S. president to be impeached twice.