equally important, they don't even have to persuade the masses. many religious folk will vote for candidate because their preacher tells them to. while it's far from every religious person, there's a very large group of religious people who will do just about anything because a guy in a suit told them god said to.
Including voting for trump. a few years ago, i was visiting my grandmother for the 4th- in Missouri, and ended up walking out of the sanctuary when they started the advertisements during the offering. Specifically advertising local businesses that were congregants (who also made a nice donation...) and politicians (who also made a nice donation...) but ran an advertisent saying trump was the only godly choice.
now, I'm an atheist, so far be it from me to tell someone they're ungodly...but I grew up in the church and... what we no publicly of him... he's as far from godly as you can get. One of the deacons walked out- mostly polite old man, at least until I wouldn't just accept assertions- to talk with me.
I said I find hard to believe that a christian church would call Trump godly. he blinked a bit and asked what I meant. I think I started with how his immigration policy was predicated on hurting people so they wouldn't come here, and how christ himself was a refugee. Then moved on to how his politics hurts the poor and destitute, while protecting and further-enriching the rich; despite christ being very opposed to the rich, and very much in support of the poor. then I mentioned the whole stormy daniels thing, and that he's had numerous affairs, and that he's a known misogynist... and just went on from there... it was very bullet-point format.
They had no real answer for it. except they did expect me to accept their assertions he was still godly all the same, and the democrats were worse. (he was, in point of fact, foaming at the mouth. might have just needed a glass of water, though.)
The point to that, however, is that there's a lot of people that will listen to preachers/religious leaders. Even if that leader really doesn't deserve it