By Nathan Layne, Julio-Cesar Chavez and Jason Lange
BLYTHEWOOD, South Carolina, Oct 22 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump is losing ground among many of the voters who returned him to the White House in 2024. But Reuters/Ipsos polling and interviews with white evangelical Christians show they remain his most reliable constituency and could prove crucial in the November 3 midterm elections.
With Republicans on the defensive amid record-low approval ratings for Trump, strong evangelical turnout could
help the party limit losses driven by voter frustration over the cost of living and the war in Iran.
That loyalty was on display last week at Village Church, an evangelical congregation in Blythewood, South Carolina, where hundreds of worshippers gathered for a weekly “Bible and Politics” sermon by Pastor Erik Estep. The backdrop: an unexpectedly competitive race for a Republican-held US Senate seat.
Speaking in the main worship hall, framed by a giant video screen and concert-style lighting, Estep did not endorse a candidate or party. But as he spoke against gambling, following sermons on abortion and socialism, he urged his predominantly white parishioners to view politics through a biblical lens.
"I believe the church is the bulwark of truth for our nation," Estep said from the stage. "And it will take people like you and churches like this church to protect this nation spiritually and morally."
The message resonated with Karen Whiting, a 72-year-old retired pharmaceutical executive who plans to vote for Republican Darline Graham over Annie Andrews, the Democrat. Graham was appointed by the governor to fill the seat of her late brother, Senator Lindsey Graham.
Whiting cited concerns that Democrats would allow transgender girls and women to compete in female sports, echoing other white evangelicals Reuters interviewed in South Carolina last week who prioritized social and religious issues over economic concerns.
"I’m voting for biblical principles, and I do not believe the Democratic Party stands for biblical principles,” Whiting said. “Without God, this country’s going to fail.”
If visitors to Village Church needed more explicit guidance on how to vote, a candidate guide available in the church lobby left little doubt. Produced by the conservative Christian advocacy group Palmetto Family Council and distributed to churches across South Carolina, it awarded Graham green check marks on all seven issues it rated, including restrictions on abortion medication and gender-affirming care, while Andrews received mostly red X's.
Andrews offered a different reading of evangelical voters’ priorities. In a statement to Reuters, she said she had visited evangelical churches and met voters of various faiths, political persuasions and backgrounds, finding that they were chiefly concerned about the economy. “They're struggling with the cost of everything. That's why I'm running,” she said.
STRONG BONDS
Reuters/Ipsos polling shows Trump's support among white evangelicals fell to 63% this month from 77% in January 2025. The decline is slightly smaller than his drop among the electorate as a whole, from 47% to 31%, and white evangelicals remain the only major demographic group tracked by Reuters/Ipsos where his support tops 60%.
The thrice-married Trump's bond with white evangelicals has survived a decade of scandals and investigations, including dozens of allegations of sexual misconduct, which he denies, and a hush-money case involving a porn star. The question for Republicans is whether economic pressures and unhappiness over the Iran war, now in its eighth month, are weakening that bond.
Reuters interviews with 15 people at two South Carolina churches suggested that his hold on white evangelical voters remained strong. At Village Church and Carolina Baptist Church in the city of Spartanburg, about a 90-minute drive from Blythewood, only 2 of the 15 said they were considering Andrews, and none indicated they were abandoning Trump.
While several voiced frustration with the Iran conflict and rising gas prices, most said they trusted Trump to keep Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon or, like Trump, blamed inflation on policies enacted under Democratic President Joe Biden.
Chad Connelly, an evangelical activist who heads the Christian voter-engagement group Faith Wins, said that while evangelicals "don't like paying higher prices," they are equally animated by social issues. Concerns about transgender athletes are "really playing everywhere" across the nearly two dozen states he has visited this election cycle, he said.
White evangelicals' loyalty to Trump reflects what Robert P. Jones, president of the Public Religion Research Institute, a nonprofit organization that studies religion and politics, calls a "grand bargain" forged during the 2016 election.
Many evangelicals have overlooked his personal conduct in exchange for his commitment to curtail abortion and LGBTQ rights, advance a conservative Christian vision of American life and pursue strict immigration policies that some supporters see as preserving the country's white Christian identity, Jones said.
"That has proven to be more powerful for this group than what they're having to pay at the gas pump," Jones, who has written extensively about the rise of Christian nationalism in American politics, told Reuters.
WHY EVANGELICALS MATTER
White evangelicals make up about 13% of US adults but nearly a third of Trump's winning coalition in 2024, according to a PRRI survey and a validated-voter analysis by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center. More than 80% voted for Trump in each of his three presidential campaigns, according to Pew. They differ sharply from Black Protestant evangelicals, who overwhelmingly support Democrats.
Evangelicals' loyalty could also prove pivotal in Senate races beyond South Carolina that may help determine control of Congress, including in Iowa and Kansas, where white evangelicals make up a significant share of the electorate.
Opinion polls suggest the race in South Carolina is close. This week Trafalgar Group, a Republican-leaning pollster, released a survey showing Andrews trailing Graham by 3 percentage points.
Part of Graham's challenge stems from lingering unease among some conservatives over her appointment to the Senate seat. Even after a boost from Trump, the political newcomer only narrowly defeated US Representative Ralph Norman in the party's August runoff, underscoring questions among some Republicans about her experience and conservative credentials.
A spokesperson for the Graham campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Yet even evangelicals lukewarm on Graham, like 53-year-old Kevin Thomas, said they felt they had no choice. Thomas, who attended the Village Church sermon, said he did not trust Andrews on transgender issues, despite a recent campaign ad in which she said she opposed both transgender women competing in women's sports and gender-affirming surgeries for minors.
“I’m leaning towards holding my nose and voting for Graham,” said Thomas, who had backed Norman. "I’m not willing to sacrifice six years of having a Democrat representing us in South Carolina."
(Reporting by Nathan Layne, Julio-Cesar Chavez and Jason Lange; Editing by Ross Colvin and Howard Goller)
