Young Evangelicals Abandon Bush; Third Party in '08?

A new report by the PEW Research Center shows that Bush's base among young voters - young, white evangelicals - is tanking hard. According to PEW, young, white evangelical support for Bush has plummeted 42%, from a high of 87% in 2002 to today's low of 45%. Consequently, this has also translated into declining support for the GOP, which has seen a 15% drop in party ID among this demographic. This decline in support is mirrored among older evangelicals, however the decline isn't nearly as dramatic among those over 30.

PEW is quick to note that this isn't necessarily translating into greater support for Democrats among this audience. Young evangelicals are still a much more conservative group than the rest of the Millennial generation. They are twice as likely to be Republican, 60% of them still support the war in Iraq, and on issues like abortion and capital punishment, they are also extremely conservative in their views.

PEW suggests that this dissatisfaction rests not so much with the party or conservative philosophy, but rather the execution of policy by this particular administration. This may well be the case, though I wonder how much Bush's stance on issues like global poverty and global warming have to do with it, as there has been a push in the evangelical community to support positions on these issues that are traditionally considered more liberal.

One issue that PEW doesn' address is what effect this might have on turnout and the election. These findings come just as The New York Times is reporting that Christian conservative leaders are considering a third-party candidate if pro-choice candidate Rudy Giuliani heads the Republican ticket. Could these young evangelicals be gearing up to have their own "Nader" moment? Are we going to see a not-insubstantial portion of the youth wing of the Republican party bolt for an independent bid as so many lefty youth did in 2000 when Nader was running on the Green Party ticket?

That would be an interesting scenario, and might even cripple the Republican candidate in a number of states as those young people, who would likely be footsoldiers in the Republican ground-game, put their efforts somewhere else (or, utterly disaffected, just sat it out at home).