Vice President JD Vance’s continuing lecturing of Pope Leo XIV at a Turning Point USA function in Georgia on Tuesday earned him a tongue-lashing on MS NOW early Wednesday morning.
Speaking to a sparse crowd, Vance, a recent convert to Catholicism, continued to harangue the pontiff over his comments that run counter to the Donald Trump administration’s policies on war and immigrants.
In a clip shared on “Morning Joe,” the Ohio Republican boldly asserted, “I think it's very, very important for the pope to be careful when he talks about matters of theology. I think one of the issues here is that if you're going to opine on matters of theology, you've got to be careful. You've got to make sure it's anchored in the truth. And that's one of the things that I try to do. And it's certainly something I would expect from the clergy, whether they're Catholic or Protestant.”
That led MS NOW host Joe Scarborough to launch into an extensive lecture aimed at Trump’s running mate.
“What, what, what are you? A king in medieval Europe?” the former GOP lawmaker exclaimed. “Warning the pope not to talk about the Bible? That's what you just said! You know how stupid you sound, right? You know how stupid you sound when you, new to the Catholic church, are lecturing, Mr. Vice President, the pontiff on theology and telling him he should not quote the red letters?”
“How utterly bizarre,” he continued. “People will look back one day and laugh when they have the safety of distance and laugh that you actually have a vice president sitting on stage warning the pope, god's representative here on earth for the Catholic church, warning the pope and what he can and cannot say about theology, that he needs to be careful.”
He added, “And so to hear a sitting vice president of the United States, first of all, becoming a Catholic last week and then writing a book about being a Catholic and then lecturing the pope, I've got to say, that's like an all-timer, and people are going to look back and they're going to have a big chuckle that anybody was ever that arrogant.”