Since his entry into the GOP presidential race earlier this month, Rick Perry has rocketed to the top of national polls and attained frontrunner status. The position of the Anybody But Mitt candidate, briefly occupied by Michele Bachmann from June to early August, is now Perry’s. The man who hosted an evangelical Christian prayer-rally-slash-revival would seem to be a strong favorite with the religious conservatives who hold significant power in several early primary states. And so far, Perry is polling well among churchgoing Republicans. For all his appeal, however, Perry has already stumbled in his handling of some social issues and in doing so, raised questions about whether the governor is in tune with the priorities of social conservatives outside Texas. Not surprisingly, Perry’s biggest supporters among religious conservatives are in his home state. In July, Perry met with a group of evangelical leaders at the Fort Worth headquarters of televangelist James Robison. A number of his evangelical supporters, including African-American and Hispanic pastors, took part in The Response in early August. And this weekend, Perry will take a break from the campaign trail to visit with a group of evangelical heavyweights that includes Christian historian David Barton and evangelist Rick Scarborough. The meeting will take place in Fredericksburg, Texas, at the ranch of Jim Leininger, a longtime Perry donor and financial backer of efforts to ban gay marriage. Perry would do well, however, to bring in some religious leaders from outside Texas. While the state is steeped in evangelical religion, it is also an insular political and cultural environment. As Gabriel Debenedetti pointed out pointed out in the New Republic last week, the religious conservatives who have powered Perry’s political success are a relatively small, extreme bunch. Perry has won his three elections as governor largely by capturing the nomination in the state’s GOP primary, a contest that draws roughly 4% of the state’s voting-age population. That small group of Republican voters has somewhat unusual priorities. Take Perry’s zealous support of the 10th Amendment and state rights. Liberal critics like to![]()
