20 Myths about Religion and Politics in America by Ryan P. Burge

Author:Ryan P. Burge [Burge, Ryan P.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: REL084000 RELIGION/Religion, Politics & State, REL070000 RELIGION/Christianity/General, SOC039000 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Sociology of Religion
Publisher: Fortress Press

Figure 11.1. Share Saying Issue Is of Very High Importance among White Evangelicals

Data from Cooperative Election Study. Stephen Ansolabehere, Brian F. Schaffner, and Sam Luks, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, http://cces.gov.harvard.edu

The issue that leads the way, by a fairly significant margin, is national security. But looking down the list of issues in order of importance, a pattern begins to emerge. The things that the majority of white evangelicals care about could most accurately be described as “bread and butter” conservative politics—things like corruption, jobs, the deficit, and crime. The takeaway seems to be that white evangelicals care about the same things that a stereotypical Republican would care about—a concept that I will talk about in more detail in myth 12.

The bottom of the graph represents the issues that seem to elicit the lowest level of concern among white evangelicals: gun control, abortion, race relations, the environment, and gay marriage. In the case of gun control, race relations, and the environment, it’s fairly clear why white evangelicals don’t place a high importance on these topics. They don’t want gun control, many don’t express a great deal of concern about the environment, and (as recent events have shown) many Republicans don’t give a great deal of credence to concepts like systemic racism.

But if white evangelicals really care about social issues, it’s pretty hard to explain why such small shares of white evangelical voters don’t think gay marriage and abortion are that important. Just 42.2 percent of white evangelicals indicate that abortion is of “very high importance”—twenty-five points less than national security and twenty-one points less than immigration. Gay marriage scores even lower, with just 17 percent of white evangelicals believing the issue is of very high importance. In 2004, just twelve years before this poll was conducted, eleven states passed amendments to their constitutions codifying marriage as between one man and one woman. The smallest margin of victory was in the state of Oregon, where 57 percent of voters supported a constitutional ban on same sex marriage.26 In 2016, only 17 percent of white evangelicals thought same-sex marriage was of very high importance. There’s little evidence that social issues are “top of mind” thoughts when white evangelicals go to the polls.

But I want to put this idea to a more strenuous test. There’s no doubt that immigration was thrust into the spotlight through the rhetoric and policies of President Donald Trump. Stories about migrant caravans moving up through Central America on their way to the southern border of the United States were regularly picked up by national media outlets. Trump’s legal challenge of DREAM act provisions along with his Muslim travel ban were some of his administration’s most high-profile policy changes. It’s fair to say that there may have been no more salient policy area between 2016 and 2020 than immigration. But how much did Trump’s support depend on his stances on immigration? To test that question, I looked at his approval rating among white evangelical Republicans based on the stances that those individuals had on immigration policy proposals.

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