United States President Donald Trump’s support among white evangelical Protestant voters remains strong but has slipped since he returned to office in January 2025, according to a new poll.
A survey released this month by a news agency and the research firm Ipsos found that Trump’s support among the group had fallen to 63 percent, down from 77 percent at the time of his second inauguration. The shift comes as his approval rating has dropped to an all-time low of 31 percent.
Poll shows slipping evangelical backing for Trump
White evangelicals are considered a key Republican constituency, and the decline could prove significant in the midterm elections on November 3. The Republican Party will seek to defend its majorities in Congress in that vote.
Also read: Trump approval falls to record-low 31% in new national poll
Democrats are widely seen as likely to take control of the US House of Representatives. Their chances of winning the Senate are also rising, amid widespread public discontent over affordability and the US-Israeli war on Iran.
Experts say Republicans are counting on their base to offset signs of a Democratic surge at the polls. Evangelical turnout is therefore seen as a potential factor in the outcome.
South Carolina rally and a tight Senate race
On Wednesday, Trump campaigned in South Carolina, a southern state within the so-called Bible Belt. Exit polls from the 2024 presidential primary found that six in 10 Republican voters in the state were white evangelicals.
Trump carried South Carolina by nearly 18 percentage points in the 2024 presidential election. However, polls have shown Republican Senate candidate Darline Graham holding only a narrow lead over Democratic challenger Annie Andrews, just two weeks before the midterm vote.
As at many of his campaign events, Trump focused his speech on social issues that resonate with conservative Christians, including policies related to transgender people. During the rally, he used an anti-transgender slur to refer to Andrews.
At another point in the speech, Trump said: “She’s a fanatical transgender activist.” Andrews holds moderate positions on the issue within the Democratic Party.
Evangelicals’ role in Trump’s winning coalition
White evangelicals have long been a key part of Trump’s coalition. According to a Public Religion Research Institute survey and a validated-voter analysis by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, the group accounted for nearly a third of Trump’s winning coalition in 2024.
Overall, about 80 percent of white evangelical voters backed Trump in the 2024 general election. The demographic makes up about 13 percent of the total US population.
Beyond South Carolina, evangelicals in the Midwestern states of Iowa and Kansas, and the southern state of Texas, could be important to whether the Republican Party keeps its hold on the Senate. Christian faith leaders are challenging Republicans in several leading races. These include Adam Hamilton, a United Methodist Church pastor, in Kansas, and James Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian, in Texas.
Both Hamilton and Talarico represent mainline Protestant denominations rather than evangelical ones. The voting patterns of white evangelicals also differ from those of other evangelical groups. Black Protestant evangelicals, for example, have remained a key Democratic voting bloc.
Trump’s standing among evangelicals compared with the public
Trump has maintained support from key evangelical leaders despite a series of scandals that conflict with the conservative values those leaders promote. He has faced allegations of sexual misconduct and extramarital affairs, which he denies.
The drop among evangelicals was smaller than the decline in Trump’s overall approval rating. His approval among the group fell 14 percentage points, compared with a 16-point drop among Americans overall. Support among evangelicals still remains strong compared with other demographic groups.
It is unclear whether shifting attitudes towards Trump will affect conservative turnout in the midterms, when he is not on the ballot. The news agency noted that white evangelicals were the only group it tracks that remained above 60 percent support for Trump in the final stretch before the midterms.
