Democratic presidential nominee Joseph R. Biden leads President Trump by 12 points with Catholics, according to an EWTN News/RealClear Opinion Research poll published Monday.
The new poll from a Catholic television network finds a slim majority of the faithful support Democrats in Congress and disapprove of President Trump.
According the poll released on Monday evening, 56% of Catholic respondents disapproved of Mr. Trump’s job as president. Meanwhile, Democrats in Congress — led by Roman Catholic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi — received a 53% approval rating.
The polling, which interviewed 1,500 U.S. Catholic registered voters at the end of August, days after the Republican National Convention, comes during a national conversation across the faith over the role church doctrine — particularly on abortion — should guide voting decisions.
On a press call, Executive Editor of EWTN Matthew Brunson noted that support for the Republican president grows when “correlating frequency of mass attendance.” Mr. Trump has courted pro-life groups with conservative court nominees.
More than nine out of 10 Catholic voters, 91%, said they are concerned about the economy. Healthcare and the coronavirus also came in as top issues, with 73% of Catholics saying the pandemic was a major concern.
The voting bloc also raised concerns about the anti-Catholic and anti-religious rioting, with 83% concerned about the vandalism and attacks against churches.
The poll was conducted Aug. 27 through Sept. 1 with 1,212 registered Catholic voters, prior to the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
The margin of error was plus or minus 3.01%.
A Pew Research Center poll released last month found Catholic voters evenly split, with 50% favoring Mr. Trump and 49% behind Mr. Biden. The center also showed that Mr. Trump carried the Catholic vote in 2016 by 52% to 44%, although other surveys have said the contest was much closer.
