Polls and Elections: The Skeptical Faithful: How Trump Gained Momentum among Evangelicals

Abstract

This article examines the origins of the unlikely alliance between Donald Trump and evangelicals, a relationship that defines the modern-day Republican Party. Using 2016 Cooperative Congressional Election Study data, I explain how Trump ultimately succeeded among this critical group of Republican primary voters in the contest for the 2016 presidential nomination by exploiting key internal divisions. Trump initially performed well among less educated evangelicals who were less devoted to their religion and less ideologically conservative. Contrary to previous research, I find that Texas senator Ted Cruz's core support among the traditional Christian Right-very conservative, churchgoing evangelicals-resisted Trump until the late stages of the nomination contest. However, Cruz was unable to expand his support among his co-religionists, despite his evangelical identity. Trump's success among evangelicals speaks not only to the oft-cited importance of momentum in presidential nomination contests, but also to the significance of candidate ideology to primary voters, especially when paired with religiosity.

Navigating Evangelical Political Identity in the Era of Donald Trump

“…The evangelicals chose to support Trump. Similar to Scala's (2020) and Myers (2019) findings, Monk-Turner (2019) claimed that evangelical support for Donald Trump was shaped by their stance on gender culture war issues. Abortion played a huge role in evangelical support for Trump.…”

“…Reed examined how Danforth's political centrism and moral political leadership were shaped by his Anglican faith. Some scholars have started to recognize the unique challenge a Trump candidacy and presidency poses for evangelical Christians (e.g., Margolis, 2019;Marti, 2019;Miller, 2019;Myers, 2019;Scala, 2020). For example, Margolis (2019) claimed that nominal evangelicals (evangelicals who only casually identify with their religion) supported Trump more than passionately engaged evangelicals.…”

“…Were they willing to support him in order to put pro-life justices on the Supreme Court and roll back laws in favor of abortion? Scala (2020) found that many evangelicals supported Ted Cruz during the 2016 primaries but latched on to Trump during the general election and well into his presidency. In the Republican primaries, these voters who held strong religious beliefs were more apt to support Cruz.…”

Does it Matter if the President Isn't Pious? White Evangelicals and Elite Religiosity in the Trump Era

“…6.Scala's (2020) recent analysis of voter behavior of the 2016 Republican Presidential primaries lends some weight to this possibility, finding that evangelicals who were less devoted to their religion were more supportive of Trump than highly devout evangelicals (who, in theory, should be the most receptive to covert cues) in the early stages of the primary.…”

Does it matter if the President isn't pious? White Evangelicals and elite religiosity in the Trump era

“…Scala's (2020) recent analysis of voter behavior the 2016 Republican Presidential primaries lends some weight to this possibility, finding that Evangelicals who were less devoted to their religion were more supportive of Trump than highly devout Evangelicals (who, in theory, should be the most receptive to covert cues) in the early stages of the primary.6 Though, it is important to note that these incidents require satisfaction of the ignorability assumption.Moreover, even if religious adherents are aware of such scandals, their reactions are also likely conditioned by negative partisanship(Margolis 2020).…”