Christian Poll: McCain Less Popular than Obama, Clinton

Republican frontrunner John McCain remains unpopular among Christian conservatives, who said they would rather vote for Democratic contenders Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, according to a new poll.

Only 9.1 per cent of respondents supported McCain, compared to Obama's 26.3 per cent - which is up 8 per cent from last week - according to GodTube.com. Clinton's Christian conservative support remains the same from the previous week at 19.6 per cent. Meanwhile, Republican underdog Mike Huckabee has the highest Christian vote, leading the poll at 45 per cent.

"Our poll clearly indicates a dramatic change in the pulse of the Christian voter this election," said Chris Wyatt, founder and CEO of GodTube.com, in a statement.

"There are a great deal of undecided Christian voters and we're in discussions with the candidates to address the Christian community directly through GodTube.com's ongoing election coverage."

GodTube.com, a users' video-based social network, has more than 2.5 million monthly visitors and over 280,000 registered Christian users, including 25,000 churches.

While the poll indicates McCain still has a ways to go with winning over Christians, the Arizona senator is doing quite well among GOP leaders.

On Thursday, former Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney endorsed McCain in his bid for the White House. The former Massachusetts governor called McCain a true American hero who could lead the United States during this "dangerous hour".

"In this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign be a part of aiding a surrender to terror," Romney said, criticising the Democrats' stance on the war on terror, according to CNN.

"I disagree with Sen McCain on a number of issues," Romney said when he announced his decision to bow out of the race. "But I agree with him on doing whatever it takes to be successful in Iraq, on finding and executing Osama bin Laden, and I agree with him on eliminating al Qaeda and terror worldwide."

Romney had suspended his campaign two weeks ago as McCain's chief rival, coming in second based on delegate counts. Romney will "release" his delegates to McCain to help the Arizona senator move faster to "secure the nomination and unite the party for the general election against the Democrats for November", according to one source to CNN.

Releasing delegates means that Romney will encourage them to support McCain's candidacy. If successful, those delegates would give McCain 1,013 total delegates, only 78 short to secure the nomination.

Huckabee, the only top-tier Republican candidate left in the race besides McCain, has 217 delegates.

Despite the near impossibility of winning, Huckabee said he will continue to run.

"I think still the Republican Party ought to be big enough to have the debate, the discussion and an election," said Huckabee after Romney's endorsement of McCain, according to CNN. "If we have a battle and [McCain] wins, he wins.

"But he hasn't won yet so I just think it's a little bit premature to go ahead and slice the cake when you haven't had the wedding yet."

The former Arkansas governor said there is a "'me too' herd mentality" in the GOP in supporting McCain.

"What I'm concerned about is that there are a whole lot of people out here in middle America who are feeling left out," he said. "They're feeling their votes aren't even going to be counted."

The next contests for Republicans will be in Wisconsin and Washington on Tuesday. Democratic candidates will also compete for Wisconsin and Hawaii on the same day.