Just a day after Pope Francis and Donald Trump appeared to be embroiled in a tense war of words over immigration, the billionaire developer has praised the Pontiff as "terrific."
The Hill reports that in an interview with Fox News Channel’s Greta Van Susteren to be aired Friday, Trump said: "I think he's a terrific person, frankly."
On Thursday, Francis appeared to question Trump’s faith when, referring to the Republican presidential frontrunner’s plan build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, he told reporters: "A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not of building bridges, is not Christian."
Trump fired back, calling the Pope’s questioning of his faith, "disgraceful."
But both sides pushed towards détente on Friday with the Vatican saying Francis’s words were not a "personal attack," and Trump saying he was ready to sit down with the Pope to discuss the immigration issue at any time.
A spokesman for Francis also said the Pontiff did not want to get involved in the 2016 presidential campaign.
"The fact that he said that, I'm very honored by it," Trump told Van Susteren.
"I don't think the Pope really understood, in terms of the crime problem and the problems of illegal immigration."
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.