Evangelicals and conservative Catholics, who have voted together for decades, are splitting apart

By Mark J. Rozell
September 8 at 6:00 AM

Recent polls contain a finding that is devastating to Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy: He is losing the Catholic vote to Hillary Clinton by an astounding 23 percentage points. However, Trump retains the sort of support from white evangelical Protestants that is typical of recent Republican presidential nominees — around 80 percent.

This contrast doesn’t just matter for Trump’s candidacy. It reveals a startling political splintering of conservative Catholics and evangelicals, who have tracked side by side for decades.

This alliance of Catholics and evangelicals came about in the 1970s. Before that, Catholics were a solid Democratic Party voting bloc, comprised largely of the immigrant underclass. Economic and social status, not moral issues, determined Catholic voting.

As the Democratic Party pushed social issues — brought to prominence in George McGovern’s presidential campaign in 1972 — and then the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision in 1973 stunned many antiabortion supporters into political action, Republican strategists saw an opportunity to transform U.S. politics by aligning evangelicals and antiabortion Catholics.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/09/08/evangelicals-and-conservative-catholics-who-have-voted-together-for-decades-are-splitting-apart/