by Elyse S. Apel
Christians helped push President-elect Donald Trump across the finish line on Election Day, a survey found.
Trump received the majority of the Christian vote, while Vice President Kamala Harris received the majority of the non-Christian vote.
This is according to a report from the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University, which surveyed 2,000 voting-age adults nationally.
The election was a historic comeback for Republicans on many fronts, with Trump being the first Republican to win the popular vote vote in over two decades.
Among self-identified Christians, Trump also received 56% of their votes, compared to the 60% Harris received from non-Christians.
Yet, because the majority of voters still identify as Christians, Trump had a larger share of the vote.
“Although Harris won a larger share of the non-Christian vote than Trump’s share of the Christian votes, Christians outnumbered non-Christian voters by more than a 5 to 2 margin – delivering the decisive Nov. 5 victory to President Trump,” the report said. “Not only did most of Trump’s votes come from Christians, but they gave him a 17 million vote cushion over Harris, which proved to be an insurmountable lead.”
Christians represented 72% of the voters who turned out.
The report also found that Catholics had record-high turnout, despite overall voter and Christian voter turnout being well below what it was in 2020.
While voter turnout was lower than 2020 in most of the Christian subgroups polled, 70% of Catholics reported voting compared to 2020’s 67%. Voters with a “biblical worldview” also voted at a higher percentage, up to 67% in 2024 from 2020’s 64%.
Just days before the election, Trump predicted that Harris would struggle with the Catholic vote on Election Day.
“Kamala Harris has finally lost the Catholic vote,” he said on social media on Oct. 25. “Her and the Democrats persecution of the Catholic Church is unprecedented! Her poll numbers have dropped like a rock, both with Catholics, and otherwise.”
While many politicos expressed concerns that Trump’s moderate pro-life stance would disenfranchise Christian and anti-abortion voters, it seems to have much less of an impact than expected.
In fact, Trump pointed to Harris’ abortion stance as pushing Catholics toward voting for him.
“Kamala is demanding late-term abortion, in months seven, eight, and nine, and even execution after birth, and people aren’t buying it – and they never will,” the former president said.
The report found that 20% of Christians selected abortion as the most-consequential issue this election, with inflation (38%) and immigration (34%) receiving even higher percentages.
Yet, potentially even more impactful on the election than the increase in the Catholic vote was the significant drop in non-Christian turnout, even higher than those reported in Christian subgroups.
The report found that adults “associated with a faith other than Christianity” and “adults who have no religious faith” had a massive drop in turnout from 2020, dropping 12% and 9% respectively.
With both of these groups historically supporting Democratic candidates, this cratering in support likely had a significant impact on Harris’ chances of winning.
George Barna, who serves as the director of research at the Cultural Research Center and led the survey, said Trump’s boost with Christians was just too much for Harris.
“Americans forget that two-thirds of adults in this nation consider themselves to be Christians,” Barna said. “Donald Trump, for all of his perceived and ridiculed faults, did a better job than did Kamala Harris of representing hallowed Christian characteristics such as the importance and support of family, the rule of law, limited government authority, financial responsibility, and the like.”
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After completing an internship in 2023, Elyse S. Apel is returning to The Center Square’s apprenticeship program, serving as the elections reporter across North Carolina and Georgia. A graduate of Hillsdale College, Elyse’s writing has been published around the country in a wide variety of publications from the “Washington Examiner” to “The American Spectator” and “The Daily Wire.”
Photo “People Voting” by Lorie Shaull. CC BY 2.0.
