Bill Donohue comments on the Catholic vote:
Catholics are a quarter of the electorate, and they voted for Obama over Romney
by the same margin as the total electorate, 50%-48%. Contrary to what many pundits
are saying, this suggests that the bishops’ campaign for religious liberty,
waged against the Health and Human Services mandate, actually paid off: Obama
got 54% of the Catholic vote in 2008 to McCain’s 45%.
Some commentators talk about the Catholic vote as if it were monolithic, and
others say it doesn’t exist. It would be more accurate to say there are four
Catholic votes: practicing and non-practicing; white and Latino.
Among practicing Catholics, Obama received 42% to Romney’s 57%; among non-practicing
Catholics, Obama picked up 56% while Romney got 42%.
White Catholics gave Obama 40% of their votes while Romney earned 59%; Latino
Catholics gave Obama 71% of their votes while Romney earned 27%.
From previous survey research published by the Pew Forum, we know that
practicing Latino Catholics are less likely to support the Democrats than are
non-practicing Latinos.
What this shows is that the more practicing a Catholic is, of any ethnic
background, the less likely he is to support the more secular of the
candidates.
Finally, there is a serious question whether non-practicing Catholics should be
considered Catholic. By way of analogy, if someone tells a pollster that he is
a vegetarian, but has long since been a veggie-only eater, would it make
empirical sense to count him as a vegetarian? Self-identity is an interesting
psychological concept, but it is not necessarily an accurate reflection of a
person’s biography.