Evangelical voters’ focus on policy over character came much earlier than you think.
The stakes in the presidential election could not have been higher.
The American economy was stagnant. Several years of the worst inflation in decades made each trip to the grocery store a painful experience. Federal spending was out of control. Drug use was on the rise. The country was in a tense standoff with both Iran and Russia, with no resolution to either conflict in sight.
But Christians were especially worried about the nation’s morals. Abortion and divorce rates were on the rise. Views of sexuality and gender were changing rapidly, and pornography use was rampant.
The incumbent president was no help. The White House was occupied by a churchgoing Democrat who was seen by many politically conservative evangelicals as weak and ineffective. He was more influenced, they thought, by secular liberals in his administration than by anyone with a biblical worldview. He wouldn’t stand up to forces of evil in the world, evangelicals decided. In fact, he was letting secular humanists persecute American churches and jeopardize Christians’ First Amendment rights.
It was time to stand up for freedom. It was time to stand up for God. And it was time to “make America great again,” in the words of the campaign slogan of the Republican candidate most of them came to support.
This Republican challenger also professed Christianity. But he went to church a lot less than the Democratic incumbent, and he’d been divorced. He “was not the best Christian who ever walked the face of the earth,” one of his supporters conceded, “but we really didn’t have a choice.” When it came to choosing candidates, evangelical Christians had once cared about character first and foremost, but now …