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Election 2024: Voters of faith overwhelmingly picked Trump

Mainline Protestant, including PC(USA), members remain politically conservative.

Photo by Tiffany Tertipes on Unsplash

It’s no surprise to anyone who’s followed politics over the past two decades to hear that self-identified Christians have largely supported Republican candidates and causes in recent elections. According to the 2024 PRRI Post-Election American Values Survey, White Christians, including Latter-day Saints, comprised 41% of all voters, who voted 72% in favor of Donald Trump. This vote was largely bolstered by evangelical and Pentecostal voters, who chose Trump by 81%.

What may surprise some Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) members is that this and other surveys show only a slight shift by those who identify as White mainline Protestants, who voted with the majority: 56% for President Trump and 43% for former Vice President Kamala Harris in the most recent election.

In 2008, following Barack Obama’s first election to the presidency, a Pew Research Study showed White evangelicals voted for John McCain at 73%, and mainline Protestants favored McCain by 55%. All Protestant voters, inclusive of Black Protestants, voted 54% in favor of McCain. White Christian voters comprised 61% of the electorate in 2008.

Eight years later, following Trump’s first election to the presidency, another Pew study showed similar results, with White evangelicals voting for Trump 81% of the time and White Protestant and Catholic voters choosing Trump by 58% and 60%, respectively.

In contrast to the political leanings of White Protestants, Black Protestant voters voted in favor of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at 90% in 2016 and for Vice President Harris by 83% in 2024. Other religious groups, including Hispanic Catholic, Jewish and non-Christian religious persons, voted overwhelmingly for Democrats in these two elections. Another demographic that solidly leans Democratic has been religiously unaffiliated persons, who chose Hillary Clinton in 2016 by 66% and Harris by 72% in 2024.

At least 52% of PC(USA) members voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election. Graphic by Ryan Burge.

The Rev. Jimmie Hawkins, director of the PC(USA) Office of Public Witness in Washington, D.C., says he’s seen mainline Protestant voters, who had historically aligned with Democratic values on issues like immigration, LGBTQ rights and economic policies, moving to the right and ultimately supporting Trump in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 elections.

Hawkins says there is a disconnect between Jesus’ core teachings on human rights, immigration, care for the poor and outcast, and social justice and the political views of many PC(USA) church members. Religious voters, he believes, are more influenced by the culture around them than by Christian values.

“We’re supposed to be different, have a different mindset,” he says. “But in reality, people are more informed by society than they are by their faith.”

Christian nationalism and a turn toward fascism, he believes, have also become defining factors in the appeal of a seemingly strong character who can resolve problems quickly, even if the means employed are antithetical to the Gospel.

“I think people are looking for someone to protect them,” he says. “People are looking for someone who talks that big John Wayne masculine image. And regardless of the fact that what [Trump] is saying is in opposition to the Christian faith, I think we’ve succumbed to a Christian nationalist thinking that says, ‘if it’s best for the country, then it’s best for the Christian faith.’ We’ve gotten so wrapped up in it that we have failed to hold on to the central teachings of Jesus.”

Hawkins arrived at the Office of Public Witness in January 2016, weeks before Trump’s first inauguration. In his first days on the job, PC(USA) and other faith-based justice offices gathered at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church to release a press statement opposing an executive order proscribing a travel ban from seven majority-Muslim countries.

Upon returning to his office, he was delighted to see a crowd of 2,000 young people protesting the ban in front of the nearby Supreme Court building. The turnout stirred in him a desire to continue and expand the role of justice work for the church.

“We’ve got to speak out publicly and very consistently,” he says. “We need to advocate a consistent rejection of policies that we feel are the opposite of what we are called to, who we’re called to be and what we’re called to do.

“We’ve also got to join with young people. Right now, the prophetic voice in this country is provided by young adults, but they don’t see the church as an ally. They don’t see the church as a partner. They don’t call us and say, how can we work together? They don’t think that we want to work together again. The image that they see [of Christianity] is a very conservative image on television.”

“Right now, the prophetic voice in this country is provided by young adults, but they don’t see the church as an ally. They don’t see the church as a partner.” — Jimmie Hawkins

First Presbyterian Church of Hastings, Nebraska, sits in a county that voted 70% in favor of Trump in the last three elections. This heartland region of the country had largely voted for Democrats prior to the 1990s.

The church’s pastor, the Rev. Greg Allen-Pickett, says that he has members of his congregation
that voted for both candidates in the election.

Prior to the election, Allen-Pickett preached a six-week sermon series titled “Building the beloved community in an age of polarization” in addition to adult education offerings. His
explicit purpose was to help the congregation think about how faith in Jesus Christ helps build
the beloved community. Implicitly, he hoped people would apply the values of the beloved
community to the candidates and assess how each either worked for or against those values.

“We had good participation.” he said. “Looking back, I put a lot of energy and effort into the
series, but I’m not convinced that it led to that kind of deep and honest assessment. So I found
the process both gratifying and a little disappointing.”

FPC of Hastings’ experience is only one example from around the denomination, but Hawkins believes it illustrates what’s happening within society, regardless of religious affiliation.

“I think the vast amount of people in this country are struggling economically just trying to make a living,” he says. “They’re afraid for what the future might hold. So anyone who gives them the promise that I’m going to make your life better in ways that are, oftentimes they have no real strategy, but they’re just making promises. I think people hold onto that.”

No political party has a monopoly on Christian values, Hawkins adds. Still, if the political rhetoric of the incoming president is any indication of what lies ahead, he believes the work of faith-based advocates following in Jesus’ tradition is going to accelerate in the coming weeks.

No political party has a monopoly on Christian values … — Jimmie Hawkins

“We’ve got to offer a counter-voice in the public arena,” he says. “We’ve got to have a prophetic voice. We’ve got to run counter to what’s going on, especially [Trump’s] threats to deport every migrant to this country.

“There’s always a new issue of justice that needs to be addressed. But we’ve got to be tireless, and we’ve got to let our faith strengthen us and inform us and guide us and trust God’s Holy Spirit to lead us in places that we oftentimes would not go on our own.”

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