Looking beyond the polls to find Catholic news hooks in stories about 2022 midterms

Political news coverage is, in part, guided by polls.

There are dozens of them that come out every few days in reporters’ email inboxes trying to gauge the temperature of the electorate on any given politician or policy decisions. This is especially true in a presidential election year. it’s also true during the midterms, which will arrive on Nov. 8.

While mainstream pollsters took a hit for being inaccurate when Donald Trump won the White House in 2016, the polls roll on as the experts put them out, pundits dissect them and news coverage reports on what they mean.

Often lost in this horse-race coverage of who’s up and who’s down are the views of real people about issues that are, in many cases, larger than partisan politics.

However, an EWTN/RealClear Opinion poll, released on July 15, took a snapshot of what Catholics are thinking, at this point in time. I wrote about its major findings for Religion Unplugged. However, there was more to this survey than a one-day headline.

There are plenty of nuggets of data that could serve as a jumping off point for news coverage in the coming weeks and months.

Overall, the survey found, in the words of Matthew Bunson, executive editor of EWTN News:

This new EWTN News/RealClear Opinion Research poll finds that Catholics — like the majority of Americans — are dissatisfied with the direction of the country, have largely negative views about most of the institutions of government save for the Supreme Court, and are deeply concerned about attacks and vandalism against churches and pro-life clinics.

The election season goes into hyperdrive this month with the first presidential debate between Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden that will take place tomorrow in Cleveland.

Since the first presidential debate in 1960, and their resumption in 1976, the format has generally been the same: candidates answer questions posed to them from a moderator.

The first debate will be held on the campus shared by Case Western Reserve University and Cleveland Clinic. The nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates has announced that Fox News anchor Chris Wallace will moderate. Wallace, a respected journalist and son of 60 Minutes legend Mike Wallace, is known for his tough questions and being fair. The president is not fond of him, to say the least.

As with anything involving Trump, expect fireworks.

That’s always the case when Trump takes the stage. Trump’s debate performance during the Republican primaries four years ago got the real estate scion the nomination in a very crowded field that included contenders like former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio, both Catholics.

As early voting continues across the country and debate intensifies over replacing Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, this first debate will be key for those undecided voters, especially ones living in battleground states that matter when it comes to the Electoral College. While the debate — the first of three between the Trump and the former vice president — will shed light on the policy and ideological differences between these two men, there will be virtually no questions regarding religion.

Pew Research put together a wonderful list of facts recently about Catholic voters in this country. It’s a resource journalists need to bookmark and filled with data that should be included in news stories, but rarely is these days. Biden is seeking to become just the second Roman Catholic president in U.S. history after John F. Kennedy in 1960.

While Catholics backed JFK 50 years ago, there is been a seismic shift in recent decades.

The various kinds of “Catholic voters” (click here for GetReligion post on that term) are a big deal in this election cycle for both Trump and Biden.

The president has already harnessed the power of four Catholics groups to help him win reelection. The former vice president, meanwhile, is trying to attract them after naming three dozen “Catholics for Biden” co-chairs. Aside from what the campaigns out out, journalists need to be on the lookout for other resources on what questions are relevant for these voters, this time around.