President Donald Trump's furious attack on Pope Leo XIV is not going to work the way he hopes, MS NOW's Nicolle Wallace said in a discussion with former Naval War College professor and conservative anti-Trump commentator Tom Nichols on Monday.
This comes at the same time that Trump was forced to delete an image of himself as Jesus he posted to Truth Social, which even many hardcore Trump supporters condemned as tasteless bordering on blasphemy.
"Let me read to you from The Washington Post: quote, 'You have to jump back to the Middle Ages, when kings and emperors were shouting against the pope in Rome and calling him false,'" said Wallace. "That was Marco Politi, a longtime Vatican watcher and author. Quote, 'There's just no other recent example like this.' Observers also note that Pope Leo is already enjoying more support in the U.S. Catholic Church hierarchy than Francis did, and Trump's attacks may fortify that trend. Quote, 'I would say there is at this moment no risk from this for the pope.'"
"In fact, Donald Trump's support among Catholics in America has dropped below 50 percent, an important marker for any politician, especially a Republican, and especially Trump, who has counted on disinformation and sort of knee-jerk symbolic faith, moves to keep that part of his coalition marching in lockstep," Wallace added.
"Yeah, a couple of things," said Nichols. "First, I should say I'm notCatholic. I'm Greek Orthodox.And, you know, my church had aschism with the Catholics athousand years ago, and wetreat the pope with more loveand respect than the Presidentof the United States does. Imean, this is really amazing."
"I think the thing thatkeeps going through my mind iswhat will it finally take formillions of people to realizethat this president is not okay,that he is not mentally stable,that there is something wrongwith him?" said Nichols. "I don't bring in theCabinet into that. They know —everybody around Trump, theyknow this. They're all justhanging on for dear lifebecause they're stuck on this,this roller coaster that'sconstantly an inch from jumpingthe tracks."
"But you know, formillions of people, you know,what does it take an attack on the pope, this kind of, you know, really sacrilegious," said Nichols. "And, for I think many Christians, including me, this really almost heretical depiction of oneself as Jesus, I mean, you know, the emotional problems here just get compounded when he says, no, no, I thought it was a doctor. No you didn't. You knew exactly what you were doing because you did it in the middle of the night."