Posted on 10/07/2019 8:21:41 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
A recent editorial in the New York Times confirms the results of my own online polling. President Trump appears to be gaining more conservative Christian voters than he is losing.
Writing for the Times on October 5, Jeremy W. Peters compiles an impressive list of former Never Trumpers who are now firmly in his camp. And quite a few of those on his list would identify as conservative religious voters.
Some of them once labeled Trump a “racist” and a “fascist.” Others, like Glenn Beck, “once called Mr. Trump ‘an immoral man who is absent decency or dignity,’” but “now says that his defeat in 2020 would mark ‘the end of the country as we know it.’”
Peters also notes that “L. Brent Bozell III, who in his National Review essay wrote, ‘Trump might be the greatest charlatan of them all,’ now counts himself as a Trump convert.”
The results of my own unscientific, online polling have confirmed a similar trend. The vast majority of those who voted for Trump in 2016 plan to do so again, while a small majority of those who did not vote for him in 2016 plan to do so in 2020.
In my most recent Twitter poll, 64 percent of those responding voted for Trump in 2016 compared to 36 percent who did not. (For context, I believe that the large majority of my Twitter followers identify as conservative Christians.)
At the rate of 15 to 1, those who voted for Trump in 2016 said they would do so in 2020.
Significantly, slightly over half of those who did not vote for Trump in 2016 said they would in 2020.
So, based on this small sampling, Trump is gaining more conservative Christians than he is losing.
Yet there’s no denying that he continues to violate Christian ethics with his mean-spirited words and behavior. And I just don’t mean his behavior towards his political enemies.
He has thrown Jeff Sessions under the bus. He has insulted Rex Tillerson. He recently blamed Rick Perry for the Ukraine phone call.
As for his attacks on his opponents, who can begin to list them all? And who, in his right Christian mind, would dream of defending them all?
Yet it appears that evangelical Christian support for the president is increasing rather than decreasing. How can this be?
There are people very close to me who voted for Trump with great reluctance in 2016 and who do not plan to vote for him in 2020. They feel his behavior has so degraded and divided the nation that, in the end, he has done more harm than good.
From what I can tell, though, this position represents the minority view among Trump voters. How, then, do we explain this?
Perhaps, when we voted for him, we said, “We hope he will keep his promises” – which he absolutely has, on many fronts – “and we hope he will change his behavior” – which he absolutely has not.
What, then, explains what appears to be our increasing support (meaning, in numbers) for the president?
Peters writes, “Few changes of heart have been as head-spinning as the social conservatives and evangelical Christians who now consider Mr. Trump a hero. Many of the conservative women who once saw him as a boor have come to believe that for too long they were focused on the wrong qualities in presidential candidates. They wanted someone pious when they should have been looking for someone who could throw punches.”
Another op-ed writer for the Times, Frank Bruni, who is known for his extreme hostility to conservative Christianity, is less charitable. His October 5 article bears this title and sub-title: "How to Sell Your Soul to Donald Trump. Mike Pompeo is just the latest lackey to teach a master class in moral surrender.”
According to Bruni, “It’s the story of Faust, who sold his soul for renown, then endured the ugliness of that deal. It’s also the story of too many of Trump’s Republican enablers to count.”
Are these perspectives accurate?
There’s certainly some truth to what these men are saying, since political allegiances, in and of themselves, often demand some level of compromise. There are no perfect candidates or perfect parties, and so voters weigh their priorities and cast their ballot accordingly. In the same way, the same George H. W. Bush who once accused fellow-presidential candidate Ronald Reagan of advocating “voodoo economics” became his Vice President.
But what both Peters and, even more so, Bruni, are missing is that the opposition to Trump has become so radicalized that his former detractors have become his supporters. In other words, the alternative to Trump has become so extreme and the attacks against him so over the top that it has become easier to rally around him.
The bias of the leftist media has become embarrassing. (I’m not claiming the rightist media is unbiased; I’m simply making a point here in the context of why Trump appears to be gaining support.)
The demonization of the Democratic Party has become alarming.
The futility of the Mueller investigation for the last two years and the current impeachment efforts add to the feeling that Trump is being unfairly attacked. (Even as the president, he has the ability to portray himself as the victim and underdog.)
And all the while, Trump is appointing conservative justices to the courts, speaking out for religious liberty, and leading a strong economy.
As for the implications of the attempts to impeach and remove Trump, Franklin Graham recently stated, “Our country could begin to unravel if an elected president is thrown out of office because of lies and the media.”
Put another way, the anti-Trump hysteria, which the president seems to stoke with joy, has created an anti-left backlash. And, since the enemy of my enemy is my friend, Trump has become the friend of many of his former enemies. It’s that simple. (This is not to defend every detail of Trump’s Ukraine call. It is question whether he committed an impeachable offense.)
For me, as an evangelical leader, the path is clear: If it’s Trump against a radical Democrat, the president gets my vote. But he doesn’t get my soul.
To maintain our integrity, that’s a distinction we must continue to make, loudly and clearly.
We will sell our souls to no one. The Lord alone owns us, and our allegiance belongs to Him. Fact.
As for our vote, it’s a pragmatic choice made in the midst of a flawed world with flawed candidates and flawed parties.
For many of us, Trump, at present, is our best alternative to the agenda of the radical left. And that’s why he has our vote.
Reading more into this is a mistake. Accusing all of us of moral compromise is an unfoundedly broad-brushed slur.
Some, indeed, have compromised. Some may have even “sold their souls.”
But many others have not. Fact.
Judges and Roe v. Wade.
Bump for Trump 2020!
You can’t be Mr nice guy with these rats. You need a street fighter like Trump.
I hear rumblings that the SHE DEVIL is waiting on the sidelines for the right time to announce her COMEBACK candidacy for the RATS nominee!! If she does, Trump will be running against the entire globalist establishment, RINOS, HELLywood etc who were stung and knocked out of the game the time around ...THEY WILL NOT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE again! I hope Trump’s team is ready cause the witch from hell is waiting on the impeachment hoax 2 or is it 3, to do more damage to trump. She needs more lies as ammo to throw at trump during the debates! It’s ALL BEEN PLANNED!! Watch it unfold...
The MSM falls all over itself to find the one guy out of 1000 who isn’t supporting Trump any more, and blows the guy up pretending he’s a “movement.”
A “movement” all right.
Of the bowel type.
Among Jewish people, it’s called the “King David” effect.
King David did lots of bad things. Very bad things. He had a zipper problem (er, button? robe? ties?) that led to effectively a murder of a good man.
While a deeply flawed man, he was also exactly the man needed for the time.
Trump is similar, on a smaller scale.
This along with the President being the only person in power standing in the way of the country becoming PRC-lite. While many do not approve of the President's behavior/persona, they fully support his agenda.
No. Sessions stabbed Trump in the back.
He has insulted Rex Tillerson.
Tillerson started it.
He recently blamed Rick Perry for the Ukraine phone call.
No, Trump simply pointed out that making the phone call was Perry's idea. Trump did not "blame" Perry for the content of the phone call or for anything.
Glenn Beck supports him to keep his show alive. He’ll turn on Trump at the first time Trump is down.
“We will sell our souls to no one. The Lord alone owns us, and our allegiance belongs to Him.”
OUR Holy writings say : Love thy neighbor”
Muzzy holy writings say: Kill your neighbor if he doee not convert to allah !
Can Christians and Muzzys ever co-exist ?
We don’t have an option to obey 6 of 10 commandments—Do muzzys have and option Not to kill us?
Evangelicals may want to consider Trump may be the most sinless man since Jesus himself. There have been literal armies scourging the earth for the slightest evidence of wrongdoing but all the can charge him with is fiction. How many of us could stand the scrutiny of one investigation requiring just three mouse clicks?
I always think of Jehu when I think of flawed kings chosen by God to do a job. Jehu was tasked with getting rid of the house of Ahab and the Baal worshippers. He killed them all, and I think he turned to idol worship in his later years, but he was the man for the job at the time.
Before he joined our team we were pretty good. We had a couple of great players, a few good ones, a bunch of players with modest talent, and a couple who struggled. We were pretty ordinary in that respect. Unfortunately, we weren't quite a championship-caliber team. For three consecutive seasons we would make the playoffs, only to lose in the first round or the championship game.
One day, before our next season began, a guy on the team says: "I have a friend named Donald who just moved into the area. He used to be a pretty good player, but he's just getting out of the military and hasn't played in a few years. Can I ask him to play for us?"
We agreed: "Sure, that sounds like a good idea."
Donald turned out to be an excellent hockey player. He hadn't played in a long time so he was a bit rusty, but in terms of hockey talent I'd say he was the second-best player on our roster.
Donald was also a pretty off-putting human being by most objective measures. He had no couth and no manners, and rubbed a few people on the team the wrong way. I had serious concerns about his off-ice antics, too ... to the point where I half-expected to be in a position where we had to bail him out of jail in time for a game. LOL.
But Donald also had something that nobody on our team had seen before: an absolutely intimidating presence on the ice that made us a feared team in the league. He was not a dirty player by any stretch, but all of the LEGAL things he did in a hockey game seemed to be done with a level of violence that we had never seen before. He had a hard shot. He passed the puck with pinpoint accuracy, and he passed the puck harder than most of our players could shoot it. He could chase a puck into the corner with three opposing players around him, and he'd gain possession of the puck 90% of the time in those situations.
He once tapped me on the helmet after I scored a goal on a magnificent pass from him; I felt like my neck compressed and my ears rang for about ten minutes.
One opposing player made the mistake of picking a fight with him, and instantly regretted it. The poor guy ended up getting hammered mercilessly for his trouble ... and when his friend jumped off the bench to help him, HE ended up getting his ass kicked by Donald, too.
Donald played two seasons for us, and we were league champions twice. He wasn't just a phenomenal hockey player. He made all of us better players, and more fearsome on the ice. By the time we won our second championship I was witnessing something I had never seen before: We would basically win games before they even began, because we could see the fear in the eyes of our opponents.
Donald is my President. I may not invite him to a wedding banquet ... but when I want to be a WINNER, he's the guy I want on my side.
I don’t disagree, but I didn’t make up the nickname.
I was not disputing the nickname.
I loved this wonderfully readable essay by Mario Murillo:
https://www.openheaven.com/2018/06/20/christians-who-hate-president-trump-by-mario-murillo/
Give it a read! I saved it for my Christian friends and family who, although they don’t vote lib, turn up their noses at trump.
Many Evangelicals stayed away from the polls in 2016 because they did not believe Trump would keep his word on Supreme Court Justices, religious liberty, and pro-life issues. Trump has followed through on all those promises; far more than anyone could have reasonably expected.
As much as possible, Trump has been a man of his word. He is now even overcoming resistance to border security; getting the wall built and making it much easier to deport illegals, even being to keep them out or sending them back in short order.
Judges, yes.
Pro-life, yes.
I would add:
Defending Christian creators’ rights to not provide service they find blasphemous.
Speaking up for Christians being oppressed around the rest of the world.
Pushing back on the transgenders being used to destroy women’s rights and violating their privacy. That’s so bad that it has caused young adult support for LBGT to fall 10-15 percentage points. It immediately morphed from “sure, you can get married, too” to “mentally ill biological men in the shower room, and you’re an evil bigot to be attacked if you don’t like it.”
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