President Donald Trump is known for making bombastic remarks and outrageous comments, and few among his inner circle rarely stand up to him. In fact, critics contend that’s part of the problem: No one in his close orbit ever tells him the truth or explains the real-world impact of his words and actions.
That dynamic is now posing a significant problem for the president ahead of the upcoming midterm elections as his ongoing bitter feud with Pope Leo XIV ricochets around his MAGA base, which is full of Christians of all denominations, and splinters over the president’s shocking remarks about the pontiff.
Now Trump finds himself in the unusual situation of trying to persuade his supporters that he’s actually not in a cantankerous exchange with Pope Leo over the president’s war on Iran, but instead the problem between him and the pontiff, the leader of a billion Catholics around the globe, is actually Leo’s fault because the pope actually supports a nuclear-armed Iran.
Astonishingly enough, that’s the latest mud the president is slinging at Pope Leo as he escalates his fight with the religious leader.
On Thursday, April 16, Trump stopped to take reporters’ questions at the White house with one yelling out, “Why are you fighting with the pope and are you worried it’s upsetting your base?”
“No, no I have to do what’s right,” Trump stated. “The pope has to understand, it’s very simple, I have nothing against the pope, his brother’s MAGA all the way. I like his brother, Lewis.”
“Then why are you fighting with him?” a reporter interjected.
“I’m not fighting with him,” Trump lied before offering up an astounding alternative version of the feud.
“The pope made a statement. He says Iran can have a nuclear weapon. I say Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon and if the pope looked at the 42,000 people that were killed over the last two or three months, as a protester with no weapons, no nothing, I mean if you take a look at that, so I can disagree with the pope. I have a right to disagree,” Trump proclaimed.
Pope Leo has never said he believes Iran should have a nuclear weapon.
Instead, Leo, the first American pontiff, has been critical of Trump’s deadly war on Iran almost since the start in late February, naming him by name and optimistically suggesting Trump would look for “an off-ramp,” but when Trump threatened to obliterate Iran’s “civilization” last week the war of words between Leo and Trump escalated.
Trump unleashed another furious backlash on social media
“Lmao now he’s literally lying on live TV making up things the Pope didn’t even say only to be corrected and look like a dumbass instantly. This guy is a f-cking clown,” X user Bill the Beaver stated.
“Every time Trump opens his dirty mouth, he lies. What a disgusting human being,” another chimed in.
This X user pointed out, “He got corrected and still stood on it… that’s crazy.”
This poster might have said it best of all, “’I have the right to disagree with something the Pope NEVER SAID’ – Trump lunatic ‘logic.’”
Leo condemned Trump’s ominous warning against annihilating Iran’s civilization, calling it a “threat against the entire people of Iran and describing it as ‘truly unacceptable,’” PBS reported.
CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten suggested Monday that Trump may be picking the wrong fight entirely and getting called out for it as he takes aim against a figure analysts say is widely embraced by Americans in a way the president simply isn’t.
“Maybe President Trump is jealous of Pope Leo XIV because it’s a blowout, it’s a blowout!” Enten said, pointing to the stark contrast in how the two men are viewed. “Pope Leo XIV absolutely crushing President Trump when it comes to how popular they are … I believe the president is making a humongous mistake going after the most popular guy in America, at least well-known guy.”
That gap isn’t subtle. Leo holds a net favorability rating of +34 points, according to an NBC News poll published in March, making him the most positively viewed public figure tested. Trump, by comparison, sits at -12 in the same survey.
“It’s a nearly 50-point blowout amongst the American public at large,” Enten added.
