Why did Americans vote for Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential election? Social scientists have proposed a variety of explanations, including economic dissatisfaction, sexism, racism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia. The current study establishes that, independent of these influences, voting for Trump was, at least for many Americans, a symbolic defense of the United States’ perceived Christian heritage. Data from a national probability sample of Americans surveyed soon after the 2016 election shows that greater adherence to Christian nationalist ideology was a robust predictor of voting for Trump, even after controlling for economic dissatisfaction, sexism, anti-black prejudice, anti-Muslim refugee attitudes, and anti-immigrant sentiment, as well as measures of religion, sociodemographics, and political identity more generally. These findings indicate that Christian nationalist ideology—although correlated with a variety of class-based, sexist, racist, and ethnocentric views—is not synonymous with, reducible to, or strictly epiphenomenal of such views. Rather, Christian nationalism operates as a unique and independent ideology that can influence political actions by calling forth a defense of mythological narratives about America’s distinctively Christian heritage and future.

中文翻译：

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让美国再次成为基督徒：基督教民族主义和在 2016 年总统选举中投票给唐纳德·特朗普

为什么美国人在 2016 年总统大选中投票给唐纳德特朗普？社会科学家提出了多种解释，包括经济不满、性别歧视、种族主义、伊斯兰恐惧症和仇外心理。目前的研究表明，独立于这些影响，至少对许多美国人来说，投票给特朗普是对美国公认的基督教遗产的象征性辩护。来自 2016 年大选后不久接受调查的美国人的全国概率样本数据显示，即使在控制经济不满、性别歧视、反黑人偏见、反穆斯林难民态度之后，更坚定地坚持基督教民族主义意识形态是投票给特朗普的有力预测因素和反移民情绪，以及更普遍的宗教、社会人口统计学和政治认同的衡量标准。这些发现表明，基督教民族主义意识形态——尽管与各种基于阶级的、性别歧视的、种族主义的和以种族为中心的观点相关——并不是这些观点的同义词，也不是这些观点的同义词，也不是这些观点的严格附带现象。相反，基督教民族主义作为一种独特而独立的意识形态运作，可以通过呼吁捍卫有关美国独特的基督教遗产和未来的神话叙事来影响政治行动。