{"id":15743,"date":"2016-08-30T22:23:00","date_gmt":"2016-08-30T22:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/news\/a-catholic-problem-for-trump-its-hard-to-say-actually-90450\/"},"modified":"2016-08-30T22:23:00","modified_gmt":"2016-08-30T22:23:00","slug":"a-catholic-problem-for-trump-its-hard-to-say-actually","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2016\/08\/a-catholic-problem-for-trump-its-hard-to-say-actually\/","title":{"rendered":"A ‘Catholic problem’ for Trump? It’s hard to say, actually"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

<\/p>\n

Washington D.C., Aug 30, 2016 \/ 04:23 pm (CNA\/EWTN News<\/a>).- With some recent election polls showing Hillary Clinton with a large lead over Donald Trump among Catholics, does Trump have a \u201cCatholic problem\u201d as some are saying he does?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s another data point that shows how difficult it\u2019s going to be for Trump to win in November,\u201d Dr. Matthew Green, a politics professor at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., said of the poll numbers. \u201cIt\u2019s increasingly looking dire for the Trump campaign.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, Dr. Mark Gray of the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University cautioned against reading too much into those polls. \u201cFor now be wary of claims either candidate has a \u2018Catholic problem\u2019,\u201d he wrote in a blog post on the matter. \u201cWe have too little data and what we do have presents a mixed picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recent Washington Post-ABC News poll numbers show Hillary Clinton with a commanding 27-point lead over Trump among Catholics. Other recent numbers \u2013 like from the Public Religion Research Institute \u2013 show Clinton winning much of the Catholic vote, including the vast majority of Hispanic Catholics.<\/p>\n

Pew Research numbers from July showed Clinton with a 16-point lead over Trump among Catholics. Trump actually won the white Catholic vote 50 to 46 percent in that poll, but lost the Hispanic Catholic vote 77 to 16.<\/p>\n

And in the Washington Post-ABC News poll, Clinton was winning a substantial margin of Catholic voters who were weekly churchgoers \u2013 a constituency that is \u201ctraditionally Republican-leaning,\u201d Green noted.<\/p>\n

However, many election polls are not revealing the religious split of respondents. And of the few polls that are, in one case the numbers wildly fluctuated.<\/p>\n

While in July, Pew reported that Clinton led Trump by 16 points among Catholics, in August Clinton\u2019s support among Catholics dropped 16 percent. Trump actually won the Catholic vote in that poll of registered voters, 42 percent to Clinton\u2019s 40 percent, with 12 percent voting for third party candidates Gary Johnson and Dr. Jill Stein.<\/p>\n

What is to be made of all these numbers? Dr. Gray cautioned that they may not reflect the electorate that turns out at the polls on Election Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cA majority of Americans see these candidates as unfavorable,\u201d he wrote of both Clinton and Trump. \u201cThe 2016 election is not about voting for a candidate as much as it is voting against one. Turnout will be key.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many people who do not normally vote could show up at the polls in November, he said, and conversely those who normally vote might stay home, disenchanted by the candidates.<\/p>\n

Also, most of the election polls aren\u2019t reporting the religion of the respondents, he added, making it impossible to \u201caggregate\u201d all the election polls and see better where the Catholic support lies.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith nearly all of the exit polls for the primaries excluding a religious affiliation question the data just aren\u2019t out there,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

However, if the polls showing Clinton far ahead of Trump among Catholics are correct, it could mean big trouble for Trump, Dr. Green explained.<\/p>\n

Catholics usually show where the general electorate stands, he said. For instance, according to Pew Research exit polls, Catholics narrowly voted for Al Gore in 2000, when he barely won the popular vote. In 2004, they voted for Bush 52-47 percent, when he won the popular vote 51-48 percent.<\/p>\n

In 2008 Catholics voted for President Obama 54-45, when he won the popular vote 53-46 percent, and they voted for him again in 2012 50-48 percent, when he won the popular vote by that same margin.<\/p>\n

So if Catholics really are supporting Clinton now by a wide margin, and the numbers hold until Election Day, it could suggest that Trump loses the general electorate as well, Green said.<\/p>\n

What might be the causes of these numbers among Catholics? It \u201ccould be that Trump has done everything from insulting the Pope to talking rather callously about immigration, which matters to a lot of Catholics,\u201d he noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost Catholics are at least aware of the history of anti-Catholicism in this country, and may be somewhat unsettled by some of the rhetoric coming out of the Trump campaign about immigration.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump also hasn\u2019t really reached out to Catholic voters like he has to other voting groups, Green insisted.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s doing these appeals not based on Catholicism, Catholic values, or the Church,\u201d Green said. \u201cHe\u2019s doing them based on economic issues or fear of immigration.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo that might happen to pull some Catholics in those areas his way, but it\u2019s a far cry from the George W. Bush strategy where you look for \u2018value voters\u2019 and what appeals to them. I don\u2019t get the impression that Trump is particularly interested in that,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

Catholic voters as a whole are also most concerned about the same issues the general public is concerned with, according to the July Pew numbers.<\/p>\n

When asked by Pew what issues were \u201cvery important\u201d for them in the 2016 election, Catholics answered foremost the economy (84 percent), then terrorism (81 percent), health care (78 percent), and immigration (75 percent). Abortion and marriage were near the bottom of the list in terms of how many Catholics deemed them \u201cvery important\u201d issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are plenty of Catholic voters who are very religious, and religious values and beliefs matter a great deal to them,\u201d Green said.<\/p>\n

So the decreased interest in social issues like abortion and marriage may reflect a \u201cgeneral\u201d decline of interest in those issues, but it may also simply be a result of \u201cvalues voters\u201d feeling like they don\u2019t have a real choice between the two candidates, he said.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Washington D.C., Aug 30, 2016 \/ 04:23 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- With some recent election polls showing Hillary Clinton with a large lead over Donald Trump among Catholics, does Trump have a “Catholic problem” as some are saying he does?<\/p>\n

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