President Donald Trump should stop implying Democrats are “godless heathens” and start following the teachings of Jesus Christ if he really wants to be the religious uniter in chief, Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough said Friday.
Following Trump’s remarks at Thursday’s bipartisan National Prayer Breakfast, Scarborough said it’s always “fascinating” to see Trump speak at religious events because “it’s like a box of chocolates—you never know what you’re doing to get.”
On Thursday, Trump told the assembled lawmakers, “God has always been the ultimate source of the strength that beats in the hearts of our nation. We have to bring religion back. We have to bring it back much stronger. That’s one of the biggest problems that we’ve had over the last fairly long period of time.”
He also called on Democrats and Republicans to work together in Washington and said that with more religion, they would be able to share meals together again.
But Scarborough took issue with the implication that Democrats were the ones responsible for the country’s spiritual decay—and he came prepared to quote the Bible to back up his point.
“If you’re going to the Prayer Breakfast, and you’re saying Democrats are godless heathens, and you don’t even understand that Jesus—one of the first things that we learn in [the Book of] Matthew on the Sermon on the Mount is that you pray for your enemies,” he said. “You pray for those who want to persecute you. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall be shown mercy.”
Trump made it clear he didn’t understand that concept in 2020, when he expressed disbelief that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi really prayed for him despite their partisan divide, Scarborough said.
The timing of Trump’s call for religion and unity was all suspicious, the host said, since it came as Trump had frozen foreign aid, include the life-saving President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR.
“It’s kind of hard to spread that message [that Democrats are godless] at the same time you’re destroying PEPFAR, at the same time you’re destroying all these other aid efforts that were actually inspired by religious organizations, and [by] presidents’ belief in Jesus Christ, and that we needed to help the poorest among us,” Scarborough continued.
Despite winning over Evangelical voters, Trump’s administration has found itself at odds with religious leaders less than three weeks after the president was sworn in.
During a nondenominational religious service the day after the inauguration, the Rev. Mariann Budde asked Trump for mercy for immigrants and the LGBTQ+ community. More conservative Christian leaders—including the Catholic archbishop of New York—have objected to Trump’s hardline immigration policies.
Scarborough said it was “interesting time” for Trump to be calling for more religion and bipartisanship but that he hoped the president really had turned a page.
“Hope springs eternal,” he said. “Let us hope that that the two sides can figure out how to get along. And that starts by one side not calling the other side godless heathens. Just a suggestion.”
