GAFFNEY, South Carolina—When two of the most visible figures on the international stage, Pope Francis and Donald Trump, exchanged sharp words over immigration on Thursday, an extraordinary election year took another dramatic twist.
The long-distance volley, impelled, like so much of the campaign, by Trump’s language on Mexican immigration, created a moment that actually merited the overused label “unprecedented.”
Popes have often commented on other countries’ politics. But no pope has as pointedly remarked on a central issue in a US presidential campaign as Francis did to reporters on his plane back to the Vatican after his trip to Mexico.
“A person who only thinks about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” the pope said, in response to a question about Trump’s oft-repeated vow to build a wall along the Mexican border. “That is not in the Gospel,” he said, according to an English translation of his remarks released by the Vatican.
And no leading presidential candidate has so sharply criticized a major religious figure as Trump did in reply.
“For a religious leader to question a person’s faith is disgraceful,” Trump said in a statement that he read aloud at a campaign appearance in Kiawah Island, South Carolina. He also suggested the Mexican government had manipulated the pope, and called himself a “good Christian.”
“If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS [Islamic State is Iraq and Syria], which, as everyone knows, is ISIS’s ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have been president,” he said, using an acronym for the Islamic State militant group.
As with previous controversies involving Trump, the long-distance exchange with Pope Francis dominated the campaign news cycle, drawing attention to him and draining it from rival Republican candidates two days before a critical primary here. In that way, the exchange once again demonstrated the New York billionaire’s unrivaled ability to use controversy for maximum political advantage.
Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, for example, had hoped to have one full day to bask in the endorsement of the state’s popular Grand Old Party governor, Nikki Haley, which helped boost him in some polls into second place here. Instead, he spent significant time responding to questions about Trump and, in the end, supporting his rival.
“I haven’t seen the context of the Holy Father’s statement,” Rubio, who is Roman Catholic, initially said. Later, in a CNN interview, he defended the idea of a border wall, saying it “is not just about immigrants,” but also about “potentially, terrorists crossing that border, not to mention the drugs that are coming across that border and the human trafficking that’s occurring.”
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who is also Catholic, told reporters he regarded the pope as his “spiritual leader,” but demurred when asked whether Francis was correct to question whether Trump is Christian. “His Christianity is between him and his creator,” Bush said of Trump, who is Presbyterian and has made a show of attending church a handful of times since he began campaigning.
None of Trump’s rivals chose to fight with him over immigration, which has proven highly combustible and has formed the center of Trump’s campaign. His call for a border wall draws loud cheers. Last week he began airing a new TV ad claiming credit for forcing other candidates to talk about it.
Moreover, while the pope enjoys widespread popularity in the US, his standing is lowest among groups who like Trump the most: Francis has more popularity among Democrats than Republicans and more liberals than conservatives, although majorities in each group view him favorably.
This fall, when the pope visited the US, about eight in 10 Democrats polled said they viewed him favorably, the Pew Research Center found. Among Republicans the share was smaller, a bit more than six in 10. Nearly four in 10 liberals said Francis had made them feel more positive about the Catholic Church; among conservatives, two in 10 said so, the survey found.
Here and in Nevada, where Trump has begun airing his immigration-themed ad in advance of Tuesday’s Republican caucuses, his supporters, prominent and not, strongly defended him. Some criticized Francis for getting involved.
“Jesus never intended to give instructions to political leaders on how to run a country,” said Jerry Falwell Jr., president of Liberty University, who has often called for basing public policy on Christian principles. Falwell, a Trump supporter, made his remarks in an interview on CNN.
“Tell the pope to take a hike,” said Mike Price, 61, a schoolteacher attending a rally in this town near the North Carolina border.
“It’s none of his business if we want to build a wall,” added Price, who was deciding between Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.
In Las Vegas a casino worker who would give only his first name, Jay, because he feared his employer did not want him talking about politics on the job, also proclaimed his support for the candidate.
“I’d vote for Trump. He speaks his mind. Why should he have to apologize?” said Jay, a Republican who was raised Catholic. The pope should stay out of US politics, he said. “What are you sticking your nose in there for?” he said. “This really isn’t your business.”
Trump said he expected his remarks and the pope’s were “probably going to be all over the world.”
“Who the hell cares?” he added. “I don’t care. I don’t care because we have to stop illegal immigration.”
Francis’s words came at the end of a six-day tour of Mexico that culminated in a Mass at the border.
Asked about Trump’s pledge to build a wall and his insistence on deporting the roughly 11 million immigrants in the US illegally, the pope said he did not intend to meddle in the US election. He would give Trump the benefit of the doubt to determine whether he really said the things attributed to him, he added.
“Whether I would advise to vote or not to vote, I am not going to get involved in that,” he said. “I say only that this man is not Christian if he has said things like that.”
Trump, characteristically, offered no caveats in his response.
“The Mexican government and its leadership has made many disparaging remarks about me to the pope because they want to continue to rip off the United States,” he wrote. “They are using the pope as a pawn.”
“No leader,” he said, “especially a religious leader, should have the right to question another man’s religion or faith.”
Image credits: Alessandro Di Meo/Pool Photo via AP