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Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life
Pew Research Center for the People & the Press
Religion in Campaign '08
Clinton and Guiliani Seen as Not Highly Religious; Romney's Religion Raises Concerns
So far religion is not proving to be a clear-cut positive in the 2008 presidential campaign. The candidates viewed by voters as the least religious among the leading contenders are the current frontrunners for the Democratic and Republican nominations -- Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani, respectively. On the other hand, the candidate seen as far and away the most religious -- Mitt Romney -- is handicapped by this perception because of voter concerns about Mormonism.
As in the past, most Americans continue to say that it is important for a president to have strong religious beliefs. And voters who see presidential candidates as religious express more favorable views toward those candidates than do voters who view them as not religious. But the latest Pew survey finds that candidates for the White House need not be seen as very religious to be broadly acceptable to the voting public.
Among people who offer an opinion of the religiosity of leading Democrats, more say that John Edwards (28%) and Barack Obama (24%) are very religious than say the same about Hillary Clinton (16%). Yet wide majorities see all three as at least somewhat religious, and those who do view the candidates in overwhelmingly favorable terms.
Similarly, just 14% who offer an opinion see Rudy Giuliani as very religious, but another 63% see him as somewhat religious, and both groups offer comparably favorable assessments of the former New York City mayor. Mitt Romney stands apart from the other candidates tested – nearly half (46%) of those who express an opinion say Romney is very religious; that is roughly the same number saying that George W. Bush is very religious (43%), though many more people express an opinion about Bush's religiosity than Romney's. However, a quarter of Americans – Democrat, independent and Republican alike – say they would be less likely to vote for a presidential candidate who is Mormon. And those who say this have substantially less favorable impressions of Mitt Romney.
In general, being a Mormon is viewed as far less of a liability for a presidential candidate than not believing in God or being a Muslim. Roughly six-in-ten Americans (61%) say they would be less likely to vote for a candidate who does not believe in God, while 45% say they would be reluctant to vote for a Muslim. At the same time, more people express reservations about voting for a Mormon (25%) than about supporting a candidate who is an evangelical Christian (16%), a Jew (11%) or a Catholic (7%).
The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press and the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, conducted Aug. 1-18 among 3,002 adults, finds that social issues such as abortion and gay marriage continue to be greatly overshadowed in the presidential campaign by both domestic issues and the war in Iraq. This is consistent with a Pew Research Center survey in June in which abortion was rated as the least important issue of the nine tested in the survey.
More than three-quarters of Americans (78%) say domestic issues such as the economy, health care and the environment will be very important in their decisions about whom to support for president; 72% say the same about the war in Iraq. By comparison, just 38% say that social issues like abortion and gay marriage will be very important in their voting decisions.