The bishop who drew ire from Donald Trump for calling on him to show “mercy” to the people who are “scared” about him taking office said she won’t apologize for her words, in a new interview with NPR.
In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump blasted the Right Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde as “a Radical Left hard line Trump hater.”
“She brought her church into the World of politics in a very ungracious way,” he wrote.
But in an interview with NPR’s “All Things Considered,” Budde rejected his characterization.
“Well, I’m not a Trump hater. I don’t hate the president, and I pray for him,” she said. “I don’t agree with some of his views of the country and the way — the decisions he makes, but I certainly don’t hate him.”
“I’m a 65-year-old grandmother, and I am not those things. So I don’t know what to say except you don’t know me, Mr. President. And I don’t think I portrayed myself in that way in the pulpit,” she continued.
In her sermon on Tuesday, Budde addressed Trump, who was in attendance, urging him “to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now.”
“There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican and independent families, some who fear for their lives,” she said. “The people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings, who labor in poultry farms and meatpacking plants, who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants.”
“They may not be citizens or have the proper documentation, but the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals,” she added.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called on Budde to apologize.
“Everybody there was shocked and mortified by the disturbing comments from this bishop who chose to weaponize the pulpit,” Leavitt told Fox News. “She should apologize to President Trump for the lies that she told.”
But Budde told NPR she was simply making a “request for mercy.”
“I don’t feel that there is a need to apologize to speak to the unity of this country that includes people that were not at all referenced in the unity that he spoke of the day before in his inaugural address,” Budde said.
The bishop added that she regrets the response her words elicited, noting that “it actually confirmed” people’s “tendency to jump to outrage and not speak to one another with respect.”
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Tuesday’s sermon was not the first time Budde has challenged Trump. The bishop went viral in 2020 for criticizing Trump’s photo op with a Bible in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church. The photo shoot happened after law enforcement officers forcefully dispersed a peaceful demonstration against the police killing of George Floyd.
“It seemed to others that I was being very brave,” she wrote in August 2020 in a piece for HuffPost’s Personal section. “Maybe I was, but in all truth, it felt more like being summoned to speak on behalf of others who were being brave, others in the church and the nation who were standing up for racial equity, others in the church and the nation were outraged by what they saw.”