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30 Percent of Americans Believe Trump Appointed President by God (www.rawstory.com)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Why do so many evangelical Christians support former President Donald Trump despite his decades of documented ungodly behavior?

An in-depth report from The Economist shows that it has a simple explanation: They believe that God personally appointed him to rule the United States.

In fact, the report cites a survey conducted by Denison University political scientist Paul Djupe that around 30 percent of Americans believe Trump "was anointed by God to become president."

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[–] QuaternionsRock 5 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

So I dug into this, and the following excerpt is the only piece of information related to the claim in question:

In the run up to the 2020 election, religious conservative public figures – for example, Rick Perry – claimed that Donald Trump was anointed by God; Perry called him “the chosen one” (see Djupe and Burge 2019). The head of Trump’s Evangelical Advisory Council, Paula White, went a bit further: “To say no to President Trump would be saying no to God, and I won’t do that.” In May 2019, 21.4 percent of Protestants believed Trump was anointed by God to be president, as did 29 percent of evangelicals, and a majority of Pentecostals (like Paula White). Belief in Trump’s anointing increased considerably closer to the 2020 election (Djupe and Burge 2020; Edsall 2020).

Here are the original sources of the claim:

I’ll keep editing this comment as I get further into it.

Edit 1: added archive link for Edsall 2020

Edit 2: fixed the link for Djupe and Burge 2019

Edit 3: Here is an archive link to the Economist article.

Edit 4: relevant quote from the Economist article:

In a survey conducted by Mr Djupe shortly before the election, three in ten Americans believed Mr Trump “was anointed by God to become president”.

Edit 5: Conclusion

It seems as though the Economist article, and therefore the Raw Story and various other articles referencing it, are not correct. I’ve looked through a couple dozen resources at this point, and I cannot find any publications from Djupe or Burge substantiating this “30% of Americans” claim. However, I did find

However, I did find this:

Other surveys have shown similar results. A 2020 Pew Research Center survey asked Americans, not just church-attenders, about God’s role in recent presidential elections. They found that 32 percent of the more than 6,000 respondents, a sizable minority, believed Trump’s election must be part of God’s overall plan—though only 5 percent of those respondents believed God chose Trump because of his policies.

So maybe the 30% finding was from Pew after all? I’m going to send all this to the Economist to ask for clarification.

[–] jacksilver 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I was able to find what I think is the original source: https://religioninpublic.blog/2019/11/25/was-donald-trump-anointed-by-god-are-all-presidents-anointed-by-god/

It was a survey of 1000 protestant Christians (in 2019) and they found that 30% of those surveyed, who went to church once a week, thought Trump was appointed by God. So terrible reporting all around.

Why I believe this is the original source is the article in the link is by the professor referenced in the original article/economist.

[–] QuaternionsRock 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

This source linked under “Djupe and Burge 2019” in my original comment :-)

It is also cited directly in Djupe’s Cambridge publication that OP posted.

[–] jacksilver 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Ah, I didn't see that initially. However, it doesn't change the fact that the study was terribly misquoted, and when looking at the original publication I didn't see the same stats shared in the blog post that were being quoted. Overall, it seems like a game of telephone was played with wrong numbers and implications being published.

[–] QuaternionsRock 2 points 11 months ago

Yeah, that’s my conclusion as well. I suppose we’ll see what the editors have to say.