Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-26T06:15:15.521Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Evangelical Vote and Race in the 2016 Presidential Election

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2018

Janelle Wong
Janelle Wong*
Affiliation:
University of Maryland
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Janelle Wong, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

This paper highlights differences in evangelical identity and its association with political attitudes across racial groups. It finds that White evangelicals hold more conservative views than Black, Latinx, and Asian American evangelicals, despite similar levels of religiosity. White evangelicals' more conservative political attitudes are driven by a sense of in-group embattlement, or the idea that their group faces as much or more discrimination as persecuted outgroups. This sense of in-group embattlement is distinct from the effects of economic resources, economic anxiety, partisanship, region (South) and generalized conservative outlook. The paper draws on survey data collected in the immediate aftermath of the 2016 election.

Keywords

evangelicalspoliticsraceimmigration2016 election
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics , Volume 3 , Special Issue 1: Race, Religion, Gender and the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election , March 2018 , pp. 81 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © The Race, Ethnicity, and Politics Section of the American Political Science Association 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Alba, Richard and Nee, Victor. 2009. Remaking the American Mainstream: Assimilation and Contemporary Immigration. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Alexander, Michelle. 2012. The New Jim Crow. New York: The New Press.Google Scholar
Austin, Algernon. 2015. America Is Not Post-Racial: Xenophobia, Islamophobia, Racism, and the 44th President. Santa Barbara, California: Praeger.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barreto, Matt. 2017. “Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey 2016 – Toplines Report.”Google Scholar
Barreto, Matt, Lorrie, Frasure-Yokley, Edward, Vargas and Janelle, Wong. 2017. “Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey 2016.” Unpublished raw dataGoogle Scholar
Barreto, Matt, Frasure-Yokley, Lorrie, Vargas, Edward and Wong, Janelle. 2018. “Best Practices in Collecting Data on Asian, Black, Latino and White Respondents Online: Case Study of the 2016 Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey.” Politics, Groups and Identities. Published online, 4 January 2018. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21565503.2017.1419433.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bean, Lydia. 2014. The Politics of Evangelical Identity: Local Churches and Partisan Divides in the United States and Canada. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Black Lives Matter. 2016. “About| Black Lives Matter.” http://blacklivesmatter.com/about/.Google Scholar
Brooks, Clem and Manza, Jeff. 1997. “Social Cleavages and Political Alignments: U.S. Presidential Elections, 1960 to 1992.” American Sociological Review 62 (6): 937–46. doi: 10.2307/2657348.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brownstein, Ronald. 2016. “How the Rustbelt Paved Trump's Road to Victory.” The Atlantic, November 10. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/trumps-road-to-victory/507203/.Google Scholar
Campbell, David E. and J. Quin, Monson. 2008. “The Religion Card: Gay Marriage and the 2004 Presidential Election.” Public Opinion Quarterly 72(3): 399–419.Google Scholar
Campbell, David E. and Putnam, Robert D.. 2012. “God and Caesar in America: Why Mixing Religion and Politics Is Bad for Both.” Foreign Affairs 91: 34.Google Scholar
Card, David. 2005. “Is the New Immigration Really so Bad?” The Economic Journal 115 (507): 300–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Claassen, Ryan L. 2015. Godless Democrats and Pious Republicans?: Party Activists, Party Capture, and the “God Gap”. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
CNN. 2016. “Exit Polls 2016.” http://edition.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls.Google Scholar
Draut, Tamara. 2016. “The New Working Class: Trump Can Talk to Disaffected White Men, but They Don't Make up the ‘working Class’ Anymore.” Salon.com. July 23. http://www.salon.com/2016/07/23/the_new_working_class_trump_can_talk_to_disaffected_white_men_but_they_dont_make_up_the_working_class_anymore_partner/.Google Scholar
FitzGerald, David Scott, Cook-Martin, David and García, Angela S.. 2014. Culling the Masses. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Fowler, Robert Booth, Hertzke, Allen D., Olson, Laura R. and Den Dulk, Kevin R.. 2010. Religion and Politics in America: Faith, Culture, and Strategic Choices, 4th edn. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Greeley, Andrew M. and Hout, Michael. 2008. The Truth About Conservative Christians: What They Think and What They Believe. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Green, Emma. 2017. “How Much Discrimination Do Muslims Face in America?” The Atlantic, July. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/07/american-muslims-trump/534879/.Google Scholar
Guzman-Garcia, Melissa. 2017. “Negotiating Christian identities in a xenophobic world: A case study of Mexican immigrants in Central California.” Paper prepared for presentation at the Race and Immigration Working Group Workshop. San Francisco State University. December 7, 2017.Google Scholar
Hankins, Barry. 2009. American Evangelicals: A Contemporary History of A Mainstream Religious Movement. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.Google Scholar
Hillygus, D. Sunshine and Shields, Todd G.. 2005. “Moral Issues and Voter Decision Making in the 2004 Presidential Election.” Political Science and Politics 38 (2): 201–9.Google Scholar
Holland, Jesse. 2016. Census: Asians Remain Fastest-Growing Racial Group in US. Associated Press, June 23. https://apnews.com/544b8c3d65394c17b960518d39eb96e9/census-asians-remain-fastest-growing-racial-group-us.Google Scholar
Jelen, Ted G. and Chandler, Marthe A.. 1996. “Patterns of Religious Socialization: Communalism, Associationalism and the Politics of Lifestyle.” Review of Religious Research 38 (2): 142–58. doi: 10.2307/3512338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones-Correa, Michael A. and Leal, David L.. 2001. “Political Participation: Does Religion Matter?.” Political Research Quarterly 54 (4): 751–70. doi: 10.1177/106591290105400404.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Robert. 2014. “Southern Evangelicals: Dwindling – and Taking the GOP Edge With Them – The Atlantic.” http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/10/the-shriking-evangelical-voter-pool/381560/.Google Scholar
Jones, Robert P. 2016. The End of White Christian America. New York: Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Jones, Robert, Cox, Daniel, Dionne, E. J., Galston, William, Cooper, Betsy and Lienesch, Rachel. 2016. How Immigration and Concerns About Cultural Changes are Shaping the 2016 Election: Findings from the 2016 PRRI/Brookings Immigration Survey. Washington DC: Public Religion Research Institute.Google Scholar
Junn, Jane. 2007. “From Coolie to Model Minority: U.S. Immigration Policy and the Construction of Racial Identity,” Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race. October. http://core/journals/du-bois-review-social-science-research-on-race/article/div-classtitlefrom-coolie-to-model-minoritydiv/99A33E7E1F288407A082A5CB72187348.Google Scholar
Kelly, Nathan J. and Morgan Kelly, Jana. 2005. “Religion and Latino Partisanship in the United States.” Political Research Quarterly 58 (1): 87–95. doi: 10.1177/106591290505800108.Google Scholar
Kim, Sharon. 2010. A Faith of Our Own: Second-Generation Spirituality in Korean American Churches. Newark: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Kromm, Chris. 2015. “How the Decline of Southern White Evangelicals Fuels the Passage of ‘Religious Freedom’ Laws.” The American Prospect, April 21. http://prospect.org/article/how-decline-southern-white-evangelicals-fuels-passage-religious-freedom-laws.Google Scholar
Layman, Geoffrey. 2001. The Great Divide. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Layman, Geoffrey C. and Carmines, Edward G.. 1997. “Cultural Conflict in American Politics: Religious Traditionalism, Postmaterialism, and U.S. Political Behavior.” The Journal of Politics 59 (3): 751–77. doi: 10.2307/2998636.Google Scholar
Layman, Geoffrey C. and Green, John C.. 2006. “Wars and Rumours of Wars: The Contexts of Cultural Conflict in American Political Behaviour.” British Journal of Political Science 36 (1): 61–89. doi: 10.1017/S0007123406000044.Google Scholar
Leonard, Robert. 2017. “Why Rural America Voted for Trump - The New York Times.” https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/05/opinion/why-rural-america-voted-for-trump.html?_r=0.Google Scholar
Lewis, Andrew R. and de Bernardo, Dana Huyser. 2010. “Belonging Without Belonging: Utilizing Evangelical Self-Identification to Analyze Political Attitudes and Preferences.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 49 (1): 112–26.Google Scholar
Lugo, Luis and Allison, Pond. 2007. ”!` Here Come ‘Los Evangélicos’!” Pew Forum on Religious and Public Life. http://www.pewforum.org/2007/06/06/here-come-los-evanglicos/.Google Scholar
Masuoka, Natalie and Junn, Jane. 2013. The Politics of Belonging: Race, Public Opinion, and Immigration. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Olson, Laura R. 2012. “Religion and American Public Life.” Perspectives on Politics 10 (1): 103–6.Google Scholar
Olson, Laura R., Wendy, Cadge and James, T. Harrison. 2006. “Religion and Public Opinion about Same-Sex Marriage.” Social Science Quarterly 87 (2): 340–60. doi: 10.1177/j.1540-6237.2006.00384.Google Scholar
Olson, Laura R. and Green, John C.. 2006. “The Religion Gap.” PS: Political Science & Politics Null 39(3): 455–9. doi: 10.1017/S1049096506060860.Google Scholar
Parker, Christopher S. and Barreto, Matt A.. 2014. Change They Can't Believe In: The Tea Party and Reactionary Politics in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Peiper, Christopher and Henderson, Matt. 2017. “10 Reasons You Can't Be a Christian and Vote for Donald Trump | Commentary | Dallas News.” November 6.Google Scholar
Pew Research Center. 2006. “Spirit and Power – A 10-Country Survey of Pentecostals.” http://www.pewforum.org/2006/10/05/spirit-and-power/.Google Scholar
Pew Research Center. 2012. “The Raise of Asian Americans.” Pew Forum on Social and Demographic Trends, Pew Research Center, Washington, CD, June 19. http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2012/06/19/the-rise-of-asian-americans/.Google Scholar
Pew Research Center. 2014. “The Shifting Religious Identity of Latinos in the United States.” Pew Forum on Religious and Public Life. http://www.pewforum.org/files/2014/05/Latinos-Religion-07-22-full-report.pdf.Google Scholar
Portes, Alejandro and Rumbaut, Rubén G.. 2001. Legacies: The Story of the Immigrant Second Generation. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Portes, Alejandro and Rumbaut, Rubén G.. 2014. Immigrant America: A Portrait, 4 edn. Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Putnam, Robert D. and Campbell, David E.. 2012. American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us. New York: Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Ramírez, Ricardo. 2013. Mobilizing Opportunities: The Evolving Latino Electorate and the Future of American Politics. Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press.Google Scholar
Sherkat, Darren E., De Vries, Kylan Mattias and Creek, Stacia. 2010. “Race, Religion, and Opposition to Same-Sex Marriage.” Social Science Quarterly 91 (1): 80–98. doi: 10.1111/j.1540-6237.2010.00682.x.Google Scholar
Smidt, Corwin. 1987. “Evangelicals and the 1984 Election Continuity or Change?” American Politics Quarterly 15 (4): 419–44. doi: 10.1177/1532673X8701500401.Google Scholar
Smith, Christian and Emerson, Michael. 1998. American Evangelicalism: Embattled and Thriving. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Smith, Christian, Michael, Emerson, Sally, Gallagher, Paul, Kennedy and David, Sikkink. 1998. American Evangelism: Embattled and Thriving. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Smith, Gregory A. and Jessica, Martínez. 2016. “How the Faithful Voted: A Preliminary 2016 Analysis.” Pew Research Center (Report). November 9, 2016. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/09/how-the-faithful-voted-a-preliminary-2016-analysis/.Google Scholar
Valenzuela, Ali Adam. 2014. “Tending the Flock: Latino Religious Commitments and Political Preferences.” Political Research Quarterly 67(4): 930–42.Google Scholar
Wilcox, Clyde and Robinson, Carin. 2010. Onward Christian Soldiers?: The Religious Right in American Politics. 4th ed. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Wilcox, Clyde and Jelen, Ted. 1990. “Evangelicals and Political Tolerance.” American Politics Quarterly 18 (1): 25–46. doi: 10.1177/1532673X9001800102.Google Scholar
Wong, Janelle S. 2014. “Democrat, Republican, or Born Again?: How Asian American Evangelicals Disrupt Traditional Political Coalitions.” Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association of Asian American Studies, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Wong, Janelle S. 2015. “The Role of Born-Again Identity on the Political Attitudes of Whites, Blacks, Latinos, and Asian Americans.” Politics and Religion 8 (4): 641–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wong, Janelle S. in press. Immigration, Evangelicals and Politics in an Era of Demographic Change. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar