In his speech at Liberty University in Virginia earlier this week, Donald Trump told students that as president, he would “protect Christianity” and wouldn’t feel the need to be politically correct like so many other politicians. At another campaign event this week at Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma, Trump declared an “assault on Christianity,” “guns,” and “everything we stand for.”
One student in the crowd at Oral Roberts said Trump’s message was unlike one he had ever heard from a politician before, and said that listening to Trump was “a shock at first, but has been generating a great response.”
Trump seemed to get a good response from both crowds of primarily Christian students he spoke to this week, and although he is not a traditional social conservative candidate, it’s possible that he may be able to win over the evangelical Christian segment of the right.
Trump currently holds a sizable lead in the polls in Iowa, where the critical first caucus will be held on Feb. 1. Many expected evangelical Iowa Republicans to lean toward Sen. Ted Cruz, but according to the latest CNN/ORC poll released Thursday, Trump is leading with 37 percent support from likely caucus-goers, while Cruz comes in second with 26 percent.
Additionally, Trump and Cruz were tied for first place when Iowa Republicans were asked which candidates’ values best aligned with their own.
However, CNN pointed out that when considering only voters who participated in their party’s most recent caucus, Trump and Cruz are nearly neck-in-neck, which means that Trump will need to persuade new voters to turn out to the caucus in order to win.
Some of these new voters will most likely be college students who were too young to participate in the previous caucus. There is no doubt the youth vote will be critical in the Iowa caucus this year — as high as 84 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds said they plan to vote.
Agence France-Presse interviewed Liberty University students after Trump’s visit this week and reported that many young evangelicals are “shaking up the hierarchy of priorities,” and along with the rest of the millennial population, are more likely to lean left on social issues such as racial equality, abortion, and same-sex marriage.
