In addition to what other comments have said. The huge proliferation of national parks and mind blowing beauty tends to attract people who are into those things

In addition to what other comments have said. The huge proliferation of national parks and mind blowing beauty tends to attract people who are into those things. This also reduces the amount of private land, making rural living more difficult and expensive. Conservatives tend to live in rural areas which weighs the political landscape towards liberals when 43% of the land is publicly owned. Compare that to Texas which is 4.2% publicly owned.