Late-night hosts Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel appeared in disbelief during an April 13 broadcast in response to Donald Trump’s social media post attacking Pope Leo XIV as “weak.” Both men regularly lash out at Trump in their monologues, but the president’s blistering attacks on the pope left them almost speechless.
“According to one Italian religious historian, even Hitler and Mussolini never attacked a pope so directly and openly,” Colbert told viewers. “It’s never nice when someone says, ‘You should really be more careful and respectful. Look, like Hitler.'”
Pope Leo has publicly opposed President Trump’s immigration policies, which caused the president’s meltdown, as well as the Iran war. The president posted on Truth Social: “Pope Leo is weak on crime and terrible on foreign policy…I don’t want a pope who thinks it’s okay for Iran to have nuclear weapons. I don’t want a pope who thinks it’s a terrible thing that America attacked Venezuela. Worse, it has emptied our nation’s prisons, including murderers, drug dealers, and assassins. And I don’t want a Pope criticizing the president of the United States because he’s doing exactly what I was elected to do: record low crime rates in a landslide and create the largest stock market in history. ”
The post prompted Kimmel to say, “What does the Pope have to do with crime? He’s not Batman, he’s the Pope. This is what happens when you sell the Bible without reading it…There’s a fight between the president and the pope. The world has become a real-life episode of South Park.”
Following his rant, Trump sparked further backlash when he posted an AI-generated image that many interpreted as Jesus Christ. The backlash was widespread and immediate, and Trump later deleted the post from his Truth social account, claiming he thought he was being portrayed as a doctor.
“So Donald Trump wants us to believe that he thought this person was a doctor,” Colbert shot back, calling it a “total excuse” by the president, adding: “If I was in the exam room and that guy came in, I’d think I was dead.”
President Trump’s excuse also drew disbelief from Jon Stewart, who asked on the April 13 episode of “The Daily Show”: “You don’t want to lie to us anymore? Are you over it? Has this relationship gotten stale? Once upon a time, your lies had real sparks… and now all you can do is say, ‘Uh, no, I wasn’t Jesus. I’m a doctor!'” I have to go back and find my happy place soon. ”
