WASHINGTON — A new poll conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and The Atlantic shows white evangelical Christians are the most optimistic religious group in America when it comes to politics.
The poll found that 61 percent of evangelicals say the United States is headed in the right direction. By comparison, 64 percent of the overall public — including majorities of other Christian groups as well as religiously unaffiliated Americans — believes the country is seriously off track.
The survey, conducted in June 2018 from among 1,000 people, asked questions about voting and political engagement. But it also broke down respondents’ answers based on religious affiliation: white evangelical, white mainline Protestant, non-white Protestant, Catholic and religiously unaffiliated.
The PRRI poll showed 77 percent of white evangelicals view Trump favorably or mostly favorably, the highest percentage since the 2016 election. By comparison, 17 percent of non-white Protestants, a group made up of African-Americans and Hispanics, viewed Trump favorably or mostly favorably.
As a group, white evangelicals also were the least likely to view America’s changing racial demographic makeup positively. Fifty-two percent of white evangelicals said they felt negatively about the prospect that non-whites would become the majority of the population by 2043. By comparison, all other religious groups in the survey viewed the changing demographics in mostly positive terms. (Religion News Service)
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