Welcome to New Jersey.
Why do I say that ? Because places like Georgia, Virginia and North Carolina are going through what we went through in the 1980’s. New Jersey was once a Republican state and in many areas deep red Conservative.
Republicans dug their own graves in a way. The constant push for more and more development (business & residential) along with tax breaks to developers led to rampant building and influxes of huge numbers of new residents (many coming from the New York City area. This coupled with large numbers of immigrants from Asia really changed the dynamic politically over time. I have nothing against people moving and immigrating but their social and political views were quite alien to old Jersey. It took a couple of decades but now these same people and their kids basically call the shots here and they are largely democrat leaning.
To make matters worse the still Conservative rural areas are completely blown away at election time by the densely populated urban and suburban regions. Now that democrats control the legislature, they amend voting districts to dilute the Republican strongholds by adding liberal urban or suburban precincts. Scott Garrett congressman from NW New Jersey was one of the most conservative members of Congress and very popular in his district but during redistricting, his district was diluted by adding much more liberal areas far to the east. He is now a former congressman.
Va, NC & Ga are seeing the same thing happen now. Rapidly expanding suburbs attract people with different values and given enough time they radically shift the political dynamic. The state’s economic successes eventually punish the people who originally made it happen.
CA. was also DEEP RED in the 80’s!!