US will have a nail-biter on Tuesday

By Rodney Martin

The Catholic dynamic in the American electorate is highly polarized between the two parties along to separate issues.

The Catholic Church presently is experiencing a schism which is demonstrated by a lot of the blowback that Pope Francis receives when he makes very controversial statements that are contrary to trigger additional Catholic dogma, particularly his most recent statement regarding civil unions for homosexuals. There is clearly a liberal wing of the Catholic Church, and then there is the traditional conservative wing of the Catholic Church, and they are clearly at odds with one another, and of course, this is now extending into the presidential election, and it was very relevant in 2016.

On one hand, the liberal wing of the Catholic Church are greatly disturbed by President Trump's immigration policies, they tend to support the Democratic candidate. And on the other hand, you have, the more traditional conservative wing of the Catholic Church, that are adamantly pro-life and against abortion, they are supporting President Trump, because President Trump pledged in 2016 to attack the Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion and to appoint pro-life judges and President Trump has delivered on that pledge.

So, these are the two issues, and the two factions within the Catholic Church, that makes up this sharp divide.

Now, politically, I've seen the quote by Mark Short and it says that the Trump campaign does not have to rely on a heavy Catholic turnout to win, that is true. The Trump campaign has to rely on an extremely heavy evangelical turnout and Donald Trump is experiencing some erosion, even in that dynamic as well, because of Donald Trump's character even some evangelicals, despite the fact that he remains very high in high, have become quite disturbed by Trump's persistent bullying, his degrading of persons of color and to some degree his immigration policies, and his positions and statements with regard to race, and further dividing the country's racial divide.

By bringing it back to the Catholic Question there is no doubt that the Catholic Church is divided along ideological grounds on issues. That is reflective in the presidential race on a couple of issues.

Probably, yeah, you're gonna see probably a 60-40 split in the Catholic vote for Donald Trump. Now, how that turns out, how that affects the election we'll see how close that is, but I might also add that Donald Trump, traditionally has had problems with the Mormon vote as well.

So, this is going to be a nail-biter election come Tuesday. I think it'll be extremely close, closer than what the mainstream media polls are predicting because the Trump support has always been under-counted and under-polled.

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*Rodney Martin is a political analyst and former congressional staffer in Arizona. He recorded this article for Press TV website.

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