Mitt Romney and the Mormon Religion

Mitt cannot ignore the Elephant in the Room

As Mitt Romney gets ever closer to winning the republican nomination, it surprising that many media sources are ignoring or lacking in coverage of how Mitt's Mormon religion will affect his chances in the general election this November. The scattered media attention the issue does get generally shows a negative bias against that American voters have against the Mormon church, but this does not necessarily entail that Romney cannot win the race. Similar to how John F. Kennedy won against a perceived bias against catholics in 1960, and how Barack Obama won against a perceived bias against African Americans in 2008, Mitt will have to overcome a great bias against the Mormon church in the 2012 electorate. Mitt will have to run an enthusiastic campaign showing great charisma (the way Kennedy and Obama did) to get people to move past the Mormon issue and onto more important issue. However, despite all of the hope and possibility that personal religion won't affect the November election, it is impossible to ignore the fact that Mitt being a Mormon will not greatly affect his chances, and it's almost guaranteed to be in a negative way.

The Mormon Religion in Opinion Polling

Numbers don't lie. And in politics, this means that public opinion polls are a highly efficient method to gather data on voter views. Recent polling data on the Mormon Religion in politics is, as expected, quite negative. In a series of polls taken last month asking if voters would feel "uncomfortable" with a Mormon as president the results sent a consistent message. These results by poll were: The Mason-Dixon Poll (28%) Public Institute Research Poll (40%) and a Quinnipiac Poll (34%). A second question posed in a Gallup Poll found that 22% of those asked would not support any Presidential candidate who is a mormon. Polling data done by The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life in late November found that 24% had negative views of Mormonism, with 15% of evangelicals saying that they would not vote for a Mormon, many of them characterizing it is as being non-Christian. Despite all these negatives the Pew Forum polls found one positive number for Romney, as only 8% of likely republican voters polled said that the Mormon issue was significant enough for them to considering not voting Republican. Meaning that even though more than a quarter of the electorate is against Mormonism in almost all polls, most Republicans consider it a much less important issue than beating Obama.

Why the American Public Holds Negative Views on Mormons

After reading polling numbers, and having a general sense of how people feel, it is pretty clear that the majority of American voters simply don't like the Mormon Religion. So the questions become what is it that people don't like about the religion? and how does this affect the election? The first thing many don't like about Mormonism is that they are extremely conservative and traditional, wearing their religion on their sleeves and chastising other Christian religions. The former would seem to push away the liberal vote, while the latter would push away the conservative vote. A second negative view that the public holds against mormonism is the notion that they practice polygamy (which is actually incorrect because it was outlawed by the church in 1890). Polling shows that 86% of people are not sure if Mormons practice polygamy, showing that most people don't know a whole lot about the religion. Regardless, the notion of polygamy is going to cost Romney votes, as a majority of both conservatives and liberals do not support polygamy. A third issue that America has against Mormons is their perceived racism. African Americans were not allowed priesthood in their church from 1852 to 1978. This affects a great deal of people, and those sensitive on the race issue already have a strong reason to vote for Obama. Perhaps most important are the actual issues within Christianity that paint Mormons negatively. So many things that Mormons believe are not views shared by other Christians. Lastly, and not to be forgotten are that the atheists, agnostics, and non-religious vote that simply does not want a president brining faith into the office. This group is much less likely to vote for a Mormon than a non-religious candidate.

The Money Factor

After a high public demand for Mitt Romney to show his tax returns from recent years, many people are surprised over the amount he has given to the tax-deductible Mormon Church. Mormons are required to tithe 10% of their income to the church, which Romney topped by giving over $4.1 million in straight donations over two years to the Mormon church, and several million more in 2010/2011 to charity, resulting in roughly 16% of his income over those two years. By contrast, Obama has figured to have given about 14% of his income to charities over the past two years. The strong level of donations by Mitt, much higher than his chief Republican rival Newt Gingrich may actually win some religious voters over. His large donations do show his commitment to his faith.

Mormonism in Winning States

If there is one area where Mitt Romney's Mormon beliefs could help him, it is in winning states with large Mormon populations. The problem here is that most Mormons are concentrated in a very small number of states. Still, I think it is interesting to look at some of the higher Mormon populated states and see if Romney can make improvements over states won by McCain in 2008. The data used is the most recent I could find and from 2006. This shows the percentage of Mormons in the state, who won the state in '08 and with what percentage of the vote, and lastly how 2012 should play out.

1. Utah (72%) Won by McCain (62%) in 2008 - Likely Republican in 2012
2. Idaho (27%) Won by McCain (62%) in 2008 - Likely Repulbican in 2012
3. Wyoming (11%) Won by McCain (65%) in 2008 - Likely Republican in 2012
4. Nevada (7.1%) Won by Obama (55%) in 2008 - Battleground state in 2012
5. Arizona (6%) Won by McCain (54%) in 2008 - Semi-safe for Republicans in 2012
6. Hawaii (5.1%) Won by Obama (71%) in 2008 - Likely Democrat in 2012
7. Montana (4.6%) Won by Mccain (49%) in 2008 - Battleground state in 2012
8. Alaska (4.2%) Won by McCain (59%) in 2008 - Likely Republican in 2012
9. Oregon (4%) Won by Obama (57%) in 2008 - Likely Democrat in 2012
10. Washington (3.9%) Won by Obama (58%) in 2008 - Likely Democrat in 2012

These statistics from the Top 10 Populated Mormon states infer that Romney's Mormon vote may be a factor in helping him gain ground on what McCain did in Nevada, and maintain McCain's wins in Montana and Arizona. Utah, Idaho, Alaska and Wyoming will all likely vote Republican regardless of the Mormon factor.

What it all means for Obama

President Obama may end up being the largest beneficiary of America's dislike for Mormonism this November. One could make the argument that Obama already has most of the non-religious vote in his liberal base, and any gains in the conservative christian base are the benefit of running against Romney as opposed to another Republican. In terms of religion affecting Obama's campaign, many evangelical voters already do not support him. Some were even going to the length of erroneously defining him as a muslim in hopes to scare away the christian vote from him. In actual policy matters, Obama holds many of the standard Democratic party views that evangelicals despise, (he is pro choice, pro gay rights, supports stem cell research etc.) but if they are more against Romney's mormonism than this, Obama have a significantly easier time winning this election. Evangelicals will play a very key role in 2012, because if Romney loses them, a base that McCain had even while losing in 2008, he will have a next to impossible chance at winning the general election.