Washington D.C., Nov 9, 2016 / 04:34 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Catholics voted once again for the winning presidential candidate in Tuesday’s election, as they have done in recent elections.
“Catholics continue to be the only major religious voting block that can shift from one election to the next,” Dr. Mark Gray of the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University stated on Wednesday.
“This is what makes the Catholic vote such an important swing vote. Presidential candidates who win the Catholic vote almost always win the presidency,” he added.
The few election polls that did list respondents by religion showed results for Catholics that varied widely depending on the day. Polling experts who warned of “volatility in the polls” insisted that the Catholic vote would be almost impossible to predict before the election.
For instance, one Investor’s Business Daily tracking poll showed Trump winning Catholics by 16 points on Nov. 4, only to have Clinton winning Catholic voters by three points on Nov. 7.
After President Obama narrowly carried the Catholic vote by two points in his 2012 re-election bid, Trump won the Catholic vote by seven points on Tuesday, according to exit polls. The Pew Research Center reported on the religious voter data. This marks the fourth straight election that Catholics have voted for the winning president.
In 2000, Catholics also voted for the winner of the popular vote Al Gore, who narrowly lost the Electoral College. Trump lost the popular vote, thus breaking the trend of Catholics voting with the popular vote in presidential elections.
Trump’s margin of victory among White Catholics on Tuesday was striking. While that bloc normally votes Republican – Mitt Romney won it by 19 points in 2012 – Trump went even further and won it by 23 points according to exit polls, the highest margin of victory in that bloc since before the 2000 election.
As expected, Trump lost the Hispanic Catholic vote decidedly – 67 to 26 percent – but still at the lowest margin of defeat for a Republican presidential ticket for that bloc since the 2004 election. And, the group CatholicVote.org noted in its post-election statement, “among non-Spanish speaking Latino Catholics the margin was likely significantly closer.”
Dr. Gray cautioned that, although Catholics clearly supported Trump in the exit polls, more data may be needed for the full context. “What we don't know yet is why Catholics voted as a majority for Donald Trump,” he told CNA.
Historically, Catholics vary in their ultimate party preference – usually voting for the winning party in an election. “No other major religious group does this,” Dr. Gray emphasized. “Other Christians reliably vote majority Republican. Those of non-Christian affiliations or no religious affiliation vote consistently Democrat.”
There was a divide in support among weekly churchgoing Christians and those who do not attend church as frequently. Exit polls showed Trump winning among weekly churchgoers 56 to 40 percent, while among those attending a “few times a year” there was basically an even split.
Clinton enjoyed a large victory (31 points) among those who do not attend religious services.
Article Archive
What was the breakdown of the Catholic vote Tuesday?
Related Articles • More Articles
A patient at the new Misky María Palliative Care Hospital located on the outskirts of Lima, Perú. / Credit: Asociación de las Bienaventuranzas (Association of the Beatitudes)ACI Prensa Staff, May 4, 2024 / 08:00 am (CNA).In the context of the recent news of the death of Ana Estrada, the first person to request and receive euthanasia in Peru, there is a contrasting story to tell on care for the dying in that country: that of a new Catholic hospital on the outskirts of Lima that provides palliative care, which extends the love of Christ to those in extreme poverty who are in the final stages of their lives.The beginning of the 'Misky María' HospitalIn 2021, Father Omar Sánchez Portillo, a priest known for his extensive charitable work in the district of Lurín (south of Lima) and founder of the Association of the Beatitudes, had the dream of building a center to serve, with the "sweetness of Mary," people in situations of abandonment and extreme poverty who have terminal illnesses...
President Joe Biden presents the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Jesuit Father Greg Boyle on May 3, 2024. / Screenshot/public domainCNA Staff, May 3, 2024 / 15:30 pm (CNA).The White House on Friday announced that Jesuit Father Greg Boyle, the founder of a prominent ministry dedicated to rehabilitating gang-affiliated youth, will receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom alongside 18 other recipients this afternoon. Boyle, ordained a priest in 1984, founded Homeboy Industries in 1992 while pastor of Dolores Mission, a Catholic church and school in an area that at one time had one of the highest concentrations of gang activity in Los Angeles. Today, Homeboy Industries claims to be the largest gang-intervention program in the United States.The successful ministry, which now operates nationwide, offers training and job skills to those formerly involved in gangs or in jail, as well as case management, tattoo removal, mental health and legal services, and GED completion.Wh...
Father Roger Landry, Catholic chaplain at Columbia University, discusses the protests at Columbia University in New York City on EWTN's "The World Over with Raymond Arroyo" on May 2, 2024. / Credit: EWTN News The World Over / ScreenshotWashington, D.C. Newsroom, May 3, 2024 / 17:05 pm (CNA).Father Roger Landry, a Catholic chaplain at Columbia University, said on Thursday that the protests making national headlines at the New York City school are being organized in part by "explicitly communist" outside forces. "There is an instrumentalization of what's going on in Gaza to advance an agenda," he said. "And that is to deconstruct our present world order at which the United States is considered the top of that order."Speaking on EWTN's "The World Over with Raymond Arroyo," Landry said that he had been walking through the encampment nearly daily, conversing with student protesters and other "outside agitators." While he said he believes that many of the protesters we...