A new national poll has found that more than half of Republicans view former President Donald Trump as a person of faith, putting him ahead of his fellow Republican contenders running for president.
In a HarrisX poll conducted Sept. 8-11 for the Deseret News, registered voters were asked, “Is this political figure a person of faith?”
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Republicans listed Trump at the top of the political figures of faith list, while Democrats chose President Joe Biden as a politician with faith.
Fifty-three percent of Republicans listed Trump as a person of faith. In second place, former Vice President Mike Pence received 52%, while in third place, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) received 47%.
Only 12% of Republicans considered Vice President Kamala Harris a person of faith, with 45% of Democrats saying the same.
While the former president has been outspoken about his faith and has been involved in the tabloids over extramarital affairs, he did maintain at June’s Faith and Freedom gala that he has fought for Christian voters.
“No president has ever fought for Christians as hard as I have,” he said. “I got it done, and nobody thought it was even a possibility.”
The Deseret News-HarrisX poll found that evangelical voters and Catholic voters were more likely to pick Pence as a political leader with faith.
Half of the poll respondents did not know if GOP candidates Vivek Ramaswamy, ex-U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie had faith.
Several political pundits weighed in on this poll on social media.
One social media user called it “an astonishing poll.”
This is an astonishing poll. Over HALF of #Republicans think #Trump is a “man of faith”, while only 1/4 and 1/3 think Biden and Romney are respectively.
For context, Biden and Romney have been regular (if not weekly) churchgoers and famously cite their faith with regularity. pic.twitter.com/JNhrHnRH7S
— Ben Caine (@sugar_caine_) September 27, 2023
“Poll: Republicans see Trump as a ‘person of faith’ above all other candidates. Nothing matters, words have no meaning,” Fox News contributor Ben Domenech said.
Rod Dreher, columnist and author of The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation, scoffed at the faith poll.
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“This is insane. This is cultish thinking. Why do so many Republicans have to lie to themselves about who Trump is in order to justify supporting him?” he said on social media. “Probably for same reason we have to moralize wars and geopolitics. Realism is anathema to many Americans.”
“For the umpteenth time: My former political party is a cult,” Joe Walsh, former congressman and presidential candidate, said.
