Latinos, Religion and Campaign 2012: Latino Catholics Strongly Favor Obama, Latino Evangelicals More Divided

Rapidly Growing Hispanic Support for Same-Sex Marriage 

Washington, D.C. – Latinos are divided byreligion in their preferences in the upcoming presidential election, accordingto a new Pew Research Center survey. Three-quarters of LatinoCatholics and eight-in-ten religiously unaffiliated Latinos support PresidentBarack Obama’s re-election. However, among Latino evangelical Protestants, whoaccount for 16% of all Latino registered voters, just 50% prefer Obama, while39% support his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney.

Thesesame patterns are reflected in Latinos’ partisan affiliations. Eight-in-tenreligiously unaffiliated Latino voters (who make up 15% of the Latinoelectorate) and seven-in-ten Latino Catholics (57% of the Latino electorate)are Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party. Among Latino evangelicalvoters, identification with the Democratic Party is lower; about half areDemocrats or lean Democratic, while about a third are Republicans or leantoward the Republican Party.

Asthe presidential election approaches, many Hispanic churchgoers say they arehearing from their clergy about various political issues and, to a lesserextent, about candidates and elections. Roughly half of Latinos (54%) whoattend religious services at least once a month say they have heard theirclergy speak out about abortion, while 43% have heard from the pulpit aboutimmigration, and 38% say their clergy have spoken out about homosexuality. Asmaller proportion, roughly three-in-ten, report hearing from their clergyabout candidates and elections.

Thenew survey also finds rapidly growing support for same-sex marriage amongLatinos, mirroring growing support among the general public. Half of Latinosnow favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry legally, while one-thirdare opposed. As recently as 2006, these figures were reversed (56% of Latinosopposed same-sex marriage, while 31% supported it). Latino evangelicals,however, remain strongly opposed to same-sex marriage (66% opposed vs. 25% infavor).

Thisreport is jointly produced by two projects of the Pew Research Center, the PewForum on Religion & Public Life and the Pew Hispanic Center. It is based ona nationally representative bilingual telephone survey conducted Sept. 7-Oct.4, 2012 (largely before the first presidential debate), among 1,765 Latinoadults, including 903 registered voters. The Latino electorate today includes23.7 million eligible voters – an increase of more than 4 million since 2008.Overall, Latinos now account for 11% of the nation’s eligible electorate, upfrom 9.5% in 2008. In addition, Latinos make up at least 14% of all eligiblevoters in three battleground states this year – Colorado, Florida and Nevada.

The survey is available on the Pew Forum’s website.

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The Pew ResearchCenter’s Forum on Religion & Public Life conducts surveys, demographicanalyses and other social science research on important aspects of religion andpublic life in the U.S. and around the world. ThePew Hispanic Center is a nonpartisan research organization that seeks toimprove understanding of the U.S. Hispanic population and to chronicle Latinos’growing impact on the nation. Both are projects of the Washington-basedPew Research Center, a nonpartisan, non-advocacy “fact-tank” that does not takepositions on policy debates or any of the issues it covers.