Report: Catholic Hispanic voters still strong Democrats, but motivation to vote is weak

Washington D.C., Oct 17, 2010 / 16:55 pm

A new survey finds that Catholic Hispanics strongly support Democrats for Congress in the November election, while Protestant Hispanics are closely divided.

The Pew Hispanic Center reports that 65 percent of Latino registered voters said they will support the Democratic congressional candidate, compared to 47 percent of registered voters overall. Twenty-two percent expressed support for the Republican candidate, compared to 44 percent of overall voters.

By a margin of 69 to 19 percent, Hispanic Catholics said they support Democrats over Republicans. However, 45 percent of Hispanic Protestants said they will support Democrats and 41 percent say Republicans.

According to the Pew Hispanic Center, about 64 percent of Hispanic registered voters are Catholic, while 22 percent are Protestant.

Only 32 percent of registered Latino voters said they had given the upcoming election “quite a lot of thought,” compared to half of all registered voters. Of Hispanic Republicans, 44 percent said they had paid significant attention to the upcoming election, while 28 percent of Hispanic Democrats said the same.

About 51 percent of Hispanic respondents told the survey they are absolutely certain they will vote, compared to 70 percent of the overall population.

Hispanic voters also tended to have a more favorable view of President Barack Obama. About 63 percent approved of his performance, compared to 47 percent of the general population. However, 51 percent said his policies have had no effect on Latinos while 26 percent expressed the view that they have been helpful.

The Pew Hispanic Center’s bilingual survey of 1,375 Latinos included 618 registered voters. For registered voters, the survey claims a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points.