Border czar and self-professed “lifelong Catholic” Tom Homan is Team Trump in the president’s battle with the pope.
The unlikely public spat kicked off on Sunday when Pope Leo XIV criticized Donald Trump’s war on Iran. Trump and his most loyal servants have lashed out at the pontiff, urging the church to stay out of political matters.
Even recent Catholic convert JD Vance told Leo to stay in his lane. “It would be best for the Vatican to stick to matters of morality, to stick to matters of what’s going on in the Catholic Church and let the president of the United States stick to dictating American public policy,” the vice president said in an interview on Fox News on Monday night.
Tom Homan agrees with Vance’s take. Asked by a reporter for his take on a controversial post by President Trump where he depicted himself as Jesus, Homan responded, “Look, I’m not gonna speak for the president. I’m speaking for myself, a lifelong Catholic. I wish they would stay out of immigration if they don’t know what they’re talking about.”
Pope Leo XIV strongly advocates for the humane treatment and dignity of immigrants, frequently criticizing the Trump administration for its heavy-handed approach to deportations. The Bible, which Trump, Vance, and Homan profess to abide by, has many chapters relating to the treatment of outsiders. “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them,” Leviticus 19:33–34 states, for example.
But Homan was unmoved in his beliefs. “If they wore my shoes for 40 years and talked to a 9-year-old little girl that got raped multiple times, or stood in the back of a trailer, 19 dead aliens at my feet, including a 5-year-old boy that baked to death, if they understood the atrocities that happened on open border, I think they, their opinion would change,” he told reporters.
He added that “I welcome discussion,” but “illegal immigration is not a victimless crime.”
He claims lives are being “saved” by Trump’s border policies. “He’s saving thousands of lives a year because he has a secure border. Human traffickers are out of business, right?” Homan said.
“The cartels are going bankrupt because of that secure border. I wish that they’d [the Catholic Church] understand that, because if they did, I think they would have a different opinion.”
Leo started the war of words on Sunday by saying that a “delusion of omnipotence” surrounded Trump’s war. The 79-year-old president reacted angrily, calling Chicago-born Leo, 70, “weak on crime” and claiming he caters to “the radical left.”
“I have no fear of the Trump administration,” Leo told reporters on Monday, continuing the feud. The president was clearly still stewing over the matter just before midnight on Tuesday. “Will someone please tell Pope Leo that Iran has killed at least 42,000 innocent, completely unarmed, protesters in the last two months,” he wrote on Truth Social.
Estimates of the protester death toll vary. Indeed, Trump’s own estimates vary—he has previously said that an estimated 32,000 people had been killed in demonstrations against the Islamic regime.
