CV NEWS FEED // White Christian Democrats are dying out, according to a recent analysis from noted religious statistician and Baptist pastor Ryan Burge.
Christianity is by far the most predominant religion in the United States, which means that it’s important to track the political affiliation and voting behavior of Christians, according to Burge.
Using data from the General Social Survey, Burge created his own graphs and found that “while white Christian Democrats used to be ubiquitous across the American political landscape, they are quickly becoming an endangered species.”
That includes white Catholic Democrats as well. According to Burge, about two-thirds of Catholics were Democrats 50 years ago, while only 20% were Republicans. Today, self-identified Catholics are split fairly evenly between the two political parties.
Burge wrote that white Democratic Christians began shifting towards the political right from the early 1970s to the 1990s, when the number of white Christian Republicans went up from roughly 40% to 50%. For the next 16 years the numbers plateaued, but Barack Obama’s election in 2008 began another shift towards the Republican party “that is still ongoing,” according to Burge.
“In 2022, for the first time, the proportion of white Protestants who were Republicans rose above 60%,” he wrote.
Burge noted that though evangelicals are traditionally the most liberal Christians, more and more white evangelicals switched to Republican between 1970 and 1990.
“Now, white evangelicalism is more politically homogeneous than it’s ever been,” he wrote. “About two in three white evangelicals are Republicans, and 15% are Democrats.”
According to Burge, the political affiliation of “mainline Protestants” is fairly equal between the two parties, with about 48% as Republican and 40% as Democratic.
The only Protestants that Burge found to be more Democratic were Episcopalians—58% were Democrats and only 33% were Republicans. However, Burge noted that “the Episcopal Church represents 1.2% of the entire sample, 1.6% of all white respondents, and 3.7% of all Protestants.”
Burge further added that the overall number of white Christian Democrats in the U.S. has significantly declined in the last 50 years.
In 1972, nearly a quarter of all respondents to the General Social Survey identified as white Protestant Democrats, with just under 17% identifying as white Catholic Democrats. This indicates that around 40% of American adults were white Christian Democrats in the early 1970s,” he wrote.
In 2000, fewer than 25% of GSS respondents were white Christian Democrats. In 2022, only 13% identified as such.
“Currently, in the United States, the number of white Christian Democrats is roughly equivalent to the number of atheists and agnostics,” Burge wrote. “It is likely that in the next five years, atheists and agnostics will outnumber white Christian Democrats.
“It wouldn’t be surprising if the percentage of white Christian Democrats falls into the single digits within the next 10-15 years,” he concluded.
