Catholics Deserting GOP's Trump More Than Any Other Group

Pope Francis (Alberto Pizzoli/Getty Images)

By Eric Mack-Sunday, 28 Aug 2016

Considering Mitt Romney's 2012 campaign against President Barack Obama and Donald Trump's recent polls figures cited by The Washington Post, the Republican presidential nominee has a bigger voter issue than females, blacks, Hispanics and young voters: the Catholic vote.

The paper reported the relative shift of Catholics from the Republican candidate in '12 to Hillary Clinton now is more than any other demographic currently.

"Catholics have long been a swing vote in presidential elections, and right now they're swinging hard for Clinton," The Post's Aaron Blake wrote.

"It's also hard to overstate just how significant Trump's poor performance among Catholics is. That's because they comprise about 1/4 of voters in the United States (25 percent in 2012 exit polls) and are about as big a voting bloc as non-whites (28 percent) and independents (29 percent)."

Pope Francis and Trump notoriously feuded during the Republican primary season in February, as Pope Francis said Trump is "not Christian" for his views on immigration.

Trump shot back it was "disgraceful" for a religious leader to question his faith.

"If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is ISIS's ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the Pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have been President because this would not have happened," Trump said in a statement.

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