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Evangelicals growing tentative on Huckabee Thursday, Jan 24, 2008 By Aaron Sadler Stephens Washington Bureau WASHINGTON - Evangelical voters appear to be unwilling to unite behind Mike Huckabee, despite the presidential candidate's pedigree as an ordained Southern Baptist minister. While Huckabee leads Republican hopeful in a survey of "born again" voters released Wednesday, it was by a tenuous margin that suggested dissatisfaction with a candidate who built his campaign by courting social conservatives. Several evangelical leaders said Wednesday that like-minded voters see Huckabee as flimsy on foreign policy. With terrorism fears still on their minds, evangelicals are looking for more in a president than harmony on social issues, said the Rev. Joel Hunter, a Florida pastor. "Everybody has a question about his foreign relations experience. How is he going to be as an international player?" said Hunter, senior pastor of the 12,000-member Northland Church in Orlando, Fla. A survey of evangelicals by the Beliefnet Web site indicated 28 percent support Huckabee, compared to 21 percent for Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. A statistically similar number of born-again voters had favorable views of both men. Evangelicals spurred a Huckabee victory in the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 3, but he has not won since. And McCain cut into Huckabee's evangelical base in his narrow victory over the former Arkansas governor in Saturday's South Carolina primary. "John McCain picked up 25 percent of the evangelicals in South Carolina, and why did he do it? Because he had more experience," said Richard Cizik, spokesman for the National Association of Evangelicals. "That's the question about Mike Huckabee out there." Cizik and Hunter were among nine evangelical leaders who participated in a panel discussion of the 2008 campaign. Panelists were generally complimentary of Huckabee, who was portrayed as a new type of Christian leader focused on a broad area of policy priorities. No longer are evangelicals concerned only about sanctity of life and marriage issues, the group said. Economic, environmental, social justice and global health care issues are all priorities of a modern evangelical. Beliefnet's survey showed the economy, government corruption and poverty were the most important topics of concern to the 980 respondents. The variety of issues important to evangelicals make it difficult for Huckabee to get a foothold, experts said. "Huckabee would have already won everything if it was just going to be, 'I'm born again and I'm George Bush No. 3,'" said Bishop Harry Jackson, senior pastor of Hope Christian Church in Washington. Bush in his first term had a 79 percent approval rating among evangelicals. It has since dropped to 45 percent. Cizik said born-again voters, like much of the rest of the country, were dissatisfied with the war. Cizik said he liked Huckabee's comments that the Bush administration demonstrated an "arrogant" foreign policy. But Huckabee's freshness on international issues leave him concerned. "It may be that he is so new to the scene that he will maybe not make the nomination this year, but is he going away? No way," Cizik said. Hunter, who said he is voting for Huckabee, nevertheless criticized his fellow pastor for his hard line on illegal immigration. The new style of evangelical voter is more compassionate about immigration than Huckabee is in his plan to require illegal immigrants to return to their native countries before trying to enter the country illegally, Hunter said. Huckabee was labeled as soft on immigration just weeks ago for his support of scholarships and in-state college tuition rates for children of illegal immigrants. "I think he got bad advice from somebody who said 'You will never win the Republican nomination unless you take a hard stand on immigration,'" Hunter said. "He took a hard right, and I think it killed him, personally." |
