More NJ residents now believe there is a ‘war on Christmas’ — Do you?

Do you believe politicians are trying to remove Christianity from the Christmas holiday as part of an effort to replace religious values with nonreligious ones?

A new poll finds a growing number of people in New Jersey and across the nation believe there is an active “war on Christmas” being waged.

Dan Cassino, the executive director of the Fairleigh Dickinson University Poll, said a just-released survey finds 37% of Americans believe this, up from 29% when the question was first asked in 2013.

The poll also finds the percent of Americans who “strongly disagree” that there is a war on Christmas has declined from 54% in 2013, to 37% today.

What does 'war on Christmas' mean?

He said an example of what some consider to be a war on Christmas is “when school pageants are being labeled as winter pageants rather than Christmas pageants, or when employees at a store start to say Happy Holidays to patrons rather than Merry Christmas.”

Who is convinced the 'war on Christmas' is real?

Cassino said while evangelical Christians, conservatives and Republicans (66%) are likely to believe there is a war on Christmas “the group that believes it most is Trump supporters, 71% of those who say they voted for President Trump in 2020 also say there is a war on Christmas.”

The poll finds 14% of people who voted for Joe Biden for President believe there is a war on Christmas.

He said there has also been a big increase in the number of Hispanics who are now convinced there is a war on Christmas.

“When we first asked about this in 2019 only 9% of Hispanic and Latino Americans agreed that there was a war on Christmas, but today 39% are in agreement,” he said.

'War on Christmas' by generations

The poll also finds older people are more inclined to believe there has been a concerted effort on the part of some politicians to take “Christ” out of “Christmas”

Cassino said while 24% of Americans 18 to 29 believe there is a war on Christmas, 49% of those between the ages of 45 and 64 agree with the war on Christmas idea, along with 35% of those 65 and older.

“Older Americans are more likely to be conservative, to be Republican and to be Trump supporters, all things that make you more likely to believe there is a war on Christmas,” he said

The poll finds 54% of evangelical or “born again” Christians believe in a war on Christmas compared with 29% of those who don’t hold those religious views.

The survey was conducted between Nov. 9 and 16 using a certified list of registered voters. Respondents were randomly chosen from the list and contacted via either live-caller telephone interviews or text-to-web surveys sent to cellular phones, resulting in an overall sample of 802 respondents.

You can contact reporter David Matthau at David.Matthau@townsquaremedia.com.