Was it Just the Evangelicals that Helped Bush, or a Broader Coalition?

November 5, 2004

Source: The New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/05/politics/campaign/05religion.html/?ex=1101099600&en=d8fb19dcf74632b8&ei=5070

On November 5, 2004 The New York Times reported, "for the past four years, Mr. Bush has been deliberately assembling the building blocks of a formidable faith coalition... The president's strategists set out to improve his showing among not just evangelicals, but also Catholics, Jews, Hispanics and African-Americans by appealing to the social conservatives in each of those groups who felt alienated and disrespected by a popular culture that in their minds trivializes religion. In all of those groups, he won more of them over than he did four years ago, although the increase among African-Americans was negligible. The pivotal group may have been Catholics, who make up 27 percent of voters. According to surveys of voters conducted by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International, the president improved his showing by five percentage points among Catholics, from 47 percent in the 2000 election to 52 percent this year. In Ohio, where the Bush campaign sent thousands of field workers to Catholic churches, the margin was 55 percent to 43 percent for Senator John Kerry."