In northern Kentucky, a glimpse into the GOP voters who may be tricky for Trump

CAMPBELL COUNTY, Ky. — Mike Combs, a Kentucky native, considers himself a Republican, at least on paper. But these days, he isn't often voting like one.

The owner of a self-storage company, Combs told ABC News he's conservative, especially around fiscal issues, and would consider voting for GOP. But he said he's been turned off by the increasingly hard-line culture war message of the national party — leading him to mostly cast ballots for Democrats, including newly reelected Gov. Andy Beshear, while still supporting some Republicans in 2022 at the state level.

«The noise that's argued about today, overall, is divisive rather than solution-finding. And am I still a Republican? By registration, certainly. But by actions of late, I'm probably not on the graph chart, especially on social issues,» Combs said. «I just believe that if you believe the mantra of the Christian faith, or whatever, you care about people. People deal with people; you care about them.»

It's exactly people like Mike Combs who illustrate the electoral challenges for a changing GOP and help tell the story of this northern Kentucky county. Campbell County is both suburban and rural, encompassing a mishmash of key communities in the country's polarized political landscape.

For all of those sharp divisions, however, Combs and other Campbell County residents told ABC News on a recent reporting trip for the «Your Voice, Your Vote» series that people in the area are just «nice.» It's a dynamic they said was more representative of the neighboring Midwest — and innately averse to Donald Trump's habit of coarse, often offensive rhetoric.

Still, Campbell County voted for the former president by a roughly 25-point margin in 2016 and then a smaller, 18-point margin in