One year after his election, this is what polls say about Catholic support for Trump in the US and his immigration policy

(ZENIT News / Washington, 12.12.2025).- Nearly a year into Donald Trump’s return to the White House, a new survey suggests that American Catholics are charting a political course that sits uneasily alongside the public stance of their bishops—especially on immigration. The findings reveal a Catholic electorate broadly favorable to the president and, in significant numbers, supportive of large-scale deportations of immigrants living in the country without legal authorization.

The poll, conducted in early November and released on December 11 by EWTN News in partnership with RealClear Opinion Research, captures attitudes shaped not by campaign rhetoric but by governance already underway. Trump, who won the Catholic vote in the 2024 election, has begun implementing one of his most controversial promises: mass deportations. That policy has been repeatedly criticized by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, yet it appears to resonate with a majority of Catholic voters.

According to the survey, 54 percent of Catholic voters support widespread detention and deportation of unauthorized immigrants, while 30 percent oppose it and the remainder express ambivalence. Notably, support for deportations slightly exceeds overall Catholic approval of Trump himself, suggesting that immigration enforcement, as an issue, has taken on a political life of its own.

The divisions within the Catholic population are pronounced. White Catholics show the strongest backing for deportations, with 60 percent in favor and just over a quarter opposed. Among Latino Catholics, views are far more evenly split: 41 percent support the policy, while 39 percent reject it. These differences echo long-standing demographic and cultural divides within U.S. Catholicism, now sharpened by the realities of enforcement.

Religious practice also appears to matter. Catholics who attend Mass weekly are more likely both to approve of the president and to endorse deportations. Nearly six in ten regular Mass-goers support large-scale removals, compared with half of those who attend less frequently. A similar pattern emerges in presidential favorability: more than 60 percent of weekly Mass attendees view Trump positively, while infrequent attendees are almost evenly divided between favorable and unfavorable opinions.

Overall, 52 percent of Catholic voters report a favorable view of Trump, with 37 percent holding an unfavorable one. Among white Catholics, approval rises to nearly 58 percent, while Latino Catholics remain closely divided. The data portray a Catholic electorate that is not monolithic, but whose center of gravity leans more toward the administration than toward episcopal leadership on this issue.

The White House has been quick to interpret the numbers as validation. A deputy press secretary described Trump’s Catholic support as historic, crediting his administration with tangible actions on issues important to many believers. Officials point to initiatives aimed at combating anti-Christian bias, pardons of pro-life activists, enforcement of the Hyde Amendment, restrictions on gender-related policies affecting minors, and the defunding of abortion providers as evidence that the president has delivered on promises made to people of faith.

Other senior figures in the administration also register relatively strong Catholic approval. About half of Catholic voters express a favorable view of Vice President J.D. Vance, while Secretary of State Marco Rubio enjoys positive ratings that significantly outpace negative ones. Together, these figures suggest that the administration’s broader agenda resonates with a sizable portion of Catholic voters beyond the president alone.

Yet the contrast with the bishops’ position could hardly be sharper. In November, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a unified statement opposing indiscriminate mass deportations, approved by more than 95 percent of voting bishops. Shortly afterward, Pope Leo XIV urged Americans to take their bishops’ guidance seriously, reinforcing the moral framework the Church has long applied to migration.

The resulting tension has sparked debate among Catholic scholars. Chad Pecknold, a theologian at The Catholic University of America, argues that the polling reflects a wider public consensus in favor of deportation and suggests that the bishops’ approach has become detached from political reality. In his view, episcopal statements rely on prudential judgments shaped by liberal assumptions that no longer persuade much of the electorate, particularly on matters tied to national security and the common good.

Others see continuity rather than miscalculation. Historian Julia Young, also at Catholic University, situates the bishops’ stance within a long tradition of advocacy for immigrants. She points out that American Catholicism itself was built through successive waves of migration—from Europe in the nineteenth century to Latin America in the twentieth—and that much of the Church’s recent growth is inseparable from immigrant communities. From this perspective, episcopal concern is not abstract policy-making but pastoral realism: immigrants are not outsiders to the Church; they are its people.

Young also recalls that earlier immigrant Catholics faced fierce nativism, often fueled by suspicions that their loyalty lay with Rome rather than the United States. That history, she suggests, informs today’s episcopal caution against policies that risk stigmatizing entire communities.

Catholic teaching itself resists easy political slogans. The Catechism affirms that prosperous nations have a duty, within their means, to welcome the foreigner, while also insisting that immigrants respect the laws and cultural heritage of the countries that receive them. At the same time, it recognizes the authority of governments to regulate migration in service of the common good. The Church’s moral framework, therefore, leaves room for legitimate disagreement over policy while insisting on human dignity as a non-negotiable principle.

What the new survey makes clear is that many Catholic voters are drawing their own conclusions about how those principles apply in practice. Whether this divergence signals a lasting realignment or a momentary convergence around a single issue remains to be seen. What is certain is that immigration has become a fault line not only in American politics, but within Catholic public life itself—forcing a reckoning between moral teaching, pastoral concern, and political judgment.

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