That doesn’t make any sense.
It’s the same sort of values projection that had southerners voting for Jimmy Carter, so don’t feel too badly about it. We thought he was one of us because he was southern and he was at least nominally Baptist, so we assumed he though like us as well. Wrong.
Catholics in Massachusetts thought the same. But, Jimmuh was one and done whereas Kennedy was inflicted upon us for decades, though.
Even Bill Clinton benefitted to some extent from this, but he cured us and cured us good. Now even southern Republicans get very close scrutiny, closer from us than from other regions.