Overview
- Trump, pressed by reporters on Monday at the White House, said he would not apologize after calling the pope weak on crime and terrible on foreign policy in a Truth Social post.
- Pope León XIV, speaking to journalists on the papal plane en route to Algeria, said he does not fear the Trump administration and vowed to keep speaking out against war.
- The president posted and later deleted an AI image that showed him in biblical robes healing a patient under U.S. symbols, then said he thought it depicted him as a doctor linked to the Red Cross.
- Backlash mounted as Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni labeled Trump’s remarks unacceptable, U.S. Catholic bishops voiced dismay, and Argentina’s episcopal leaders affirmed support for the pope.
- The open confrontation is unusual between a U.S. president and a pope, raising diplomatic stakes for Washington and the Vatican as the Iran war drives sharper moral and policy divides.