“Kamala Harris made the mistake of not reaching out to the Catholic electorate”

Ln November 7, interviewed by journalists, the Cardinal Secretary of State of the Vatican, Pietro Parolin, had this very Jesuit and prudential formula about the victory of Donald Trump: “We wish him much wisdom, because it is the main virtue of rulers, according to the Bible. » Recalling, among other things, that the Catholic proposals on immigration were “very precise, very clear” and that this question deserved an approach “truly human”he also confirmed the Vatican's rapprochement with China, previously described by Mike Pompeo, then secretary of state in the first Trump administration [2018-2021]of moral fault.

But the diplomacy of the Holy See seems to have no influence on Catholic voters in the United States. Nor do the latter seem to have listened to the recommendations of their own episcopal conference, calling on them to choose candidates (in all the elections of November 5) capable of ensuring “the common good of all and the promotion of the dignity of the human person, in particular of the most vulnerable among us, including the unborn, the poor, foreigners, the elderly and the infirm, as well as the migrants ».

Catholics (around 20% of the electorate) in fact mainly voted for a candidate with unCatholic promises: expulsion of millions of people from the country, rollback of environmental regulations, repeal of the Affordable Care Act [loi qui permet à une grande majorité d’Américains de bénéficier d’une couverture santé]opposition to unions, etc. Would they have ended up massively embracing the ideology of Christian nationalism carried by certain Trumpist supporters? The answer is not that simple.

Certainly, the September pre-election polls noted the shift in the intentions of the Catholic vote, giving 47% for Kamala Harris and 52% for Donald Trump. For years, commentators have highlighted the unbalancing effect in the Catholic patchwork of the high vote of white Catholics for Donald Trump: they concentrate, in fact, very conservative and also very religious voters, hostile to abortion. This “racial” segment voted for Trump and the Republicans 64% in 2016, 59% in 2020 and 62% in the 2022 midterm elections.

Wave of virilist reaction

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