On April 12, President Donald Trump wrote a post on TruthSocial in which he berates Pope Leo XIV for criticizing the US government’s recent actions. Since then, Pope Leo XIV has stated that he was misunderstood and that he wasn’t talking about the US government, while Trump has doubled down on his claims.
Freshman Kellen Brim believes that Trump is in the wrong, because “he’s dissing the pope for doing his job.” He said, “He’s advocating against the death of random people, the death of schoolgirls, the death of an entire civilization.” He went on to say that he hopes the pope can rally against Trump, because he has every right to defend himself.
Freshman Elise Felt shared her views on the subject, saying, “I think that, overall, this is the kind of thing President Trump has been doing for years. Even in his last term, these were the things he’s been doing. So, it’s not a big surprise to me.” She continued, “I think that a lot of President Trump’s conflicts are distractions that he uses to avoid other things. As other problems arise and different things take priority, the conflicts often just fade into the background.”
When asked if she thinks people’s views of President Trump have changed, Felt said, “It really depends on what other people think. Have people found something new in this conflict to change their opinions?” Brim thinks differently, stating, “He just beefed with the Catholic Church, the biggest religion on Earth.”
President Trump claimed in one of his posts that he was the reason Pope Leo XIV was chosen. Felt said, “There are many more factors that go into selecting a pope. He could be right, that one of those factors was him, but I think that there is much more to it.” Brim simply stated, “There’s no correlation.” He believes that President Trump had nothing to do with their choice and that the decision is much more important than trying to keep him happy, Felt shared, “Mine is only one opinion,” however, there are many ways the American public could take this, especially if President Trump is someone they have supported in the past.
