Trump’s plan for mass deportation of migrants is a ‘disgrace’ – Pope

The Pope is known to hold the issue of migrants dear. During a public audience last August, he said that “systematically working by all means to deport migrants” is a “big sin”.

In 2016, before the first presidential election won by Trump, Pope Francis said “those who only think about building walls … and not building bridges, are not Christians”.

Referring to Trump’s promise to build a wall on the border of Mexico to keep migrants from traveling to the US, Francis said: “I just say that this man is not a Christian if he has said something like that. That way and I will give him the benefit of the doubt. “

Francis and Trump later met when Trump and his family visited Rome in 2017.

Ahead of the US presidential election in 2024, the Pope refused to say whether people should vote for Trump or his Democratic opponent Kamala Harris, only urging people to vote “for the worse” according to their conscience.

In an interview on Sunday evening, Francis also touched on the issue of migration to Europe, saying there is “a lot of cruelty” and that everyone has “the right to stay at home and the right to emigrate”.

The Pope also added that some of the southern European countries that receive the most migrant arrivals “do not have children and need labor”.

“In some of these countries, there are entire villages that are empty. A good, well-thought-out migrant policy will help countries like Italy and Spain as well,” he said.

In another part of the interview, Francis was asked about the war in Ukraine and the Middle East and said he did not know why making peace was so difficult.

“I don’t know why … it’s as if there is an international drive to self-destruct,” the Pope said.

Francis, 88, has been in office since 2013, when he was elected to succeed Pope Benedict XVI.