For many Americans, religion will play a major role on Election Day
A Trump supporter at a 2016 rally in Phoenix. Photo by Gage Skidmore for Wikipedia.
NEW YORK — With less than a week to go before Election Day, a new poll finds that four in 10 Americans factor in personal religious beliefs into their voting decisions.
The survey, conducted by Saint Leo University Polling Institute, asked 1,500 people — 500 of those voters in the battleground state of Florida — about the role of faith in American political life. Despite a growing number of Americans who no longer belong to an organized religion, faith continue to be a big factor in the country’s elections.
The religious affiliations of Americans have been of particular interest during this election cycle since former Vice President Joe Biden is only the fourth major-party nominee in U.S. history to be Roman Catholic. Highlighting the importance of faith is President Donald Trump’s continued courting of evangelical and devout Catholic voters across the country and particularly in battleground states he desperately needs to win.
As a result, both Biden and Trump campaigns have been aggressively courting faith communities, especially Catholics across the Rust Belt states of Ohio and Pennsylvania.
“Even though some argue that religion is fading from public life, the private religious conviction of a large part of the electorate informs their vote choice,” said Frank Orlando, who serves as director of the Saint Leo University Polling Institute. “As long as this is the case, politicians will try to woo these voters using whatever means necessary.”
In terms of the presidential race, 51% of Catholics said they will support Biden, according to the poll released Wednesday, similar to 50.7% of overall respondents who will support the Democratic nominee. Those results mirror a recent EWTN News/RealClear Opinion Research poll that found 53% of Catholics favor Biden.
The Saint Leo University poll also found:
— Those who identified as Protestant or non-denominational Christians, 57.4% agreed their religious beliefs informs their vote — more than 14 percentage points higher than the overall sample.
— The percentage is slightly higher for Roman Catholics who were polled, of whom 44.4% said they rely on their religious beliefs before voting.
— Along party lines, roughly 58% of Republicans said religious beliefs informs their vote. Of Democrats, only 39.4% responded the same way.
— In terms of overall attitudes, 50% of respondents say America is largely a secular nation. Only 30% said the United States is a Christian country.
“It's interesting to see that non-Catholic Christians are more likely to use their faith than Catholic voters,” Orlando added. “This is perhaps due to years of Catholics occupying a place outside of the mainstream of political life, and thus having to de-emphasize their religion as a means of fitting in with the dominant Protestant groups. It also goes to show that the future of the Republican party is with religious voters — one of the few groups that has remained loyal to President Trump.”
If elected, Biden would become only the second U.S. president in history to be a Roman Catholic. The first was John F. Kennedy in 1960. Trump, meanwhile, said recently that he identifies as a non-denominational Christian. In 2016, Trump captured the white Catholic vote.
Orlando said Catholics have “become the bellwether of American politics” over the past two decades.
“While this means their support is important, it also means that the idea of a Catholic presidential candidate running is not appealing to a large number of Catholic voters and not scary to a large number of non-Catholics,” he added.
Clemente Lisi is a senior editor and regular contributor to Religion Unplugged. He is the former deputy head of news at the New York Daily News and teaches journalism at The King’s College in New York City. Follow him on Twitter @ClementeLisi.