By Molly Goddard
12:25pm PST, Jan 27, 2025
"As a practicing
Catholic, I was actually heartbroken by that statement," the Republican leader admitted.
"I think that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops needs to actually look in the mirror a little bit and recognize that when they receive over $100 million to help resettle illegal immigrants. Are they worried about humanitarian concerns? Or are they actually worried about their bottom line?" Vance continued.
"If they're worried about the humanitarian costs of immigration enforcement, let them talk about the children who have been s– trafficked because of the wide-open border of [President]
Joe Biden," the right-wing politician alleged.
Vance was then questioned on whether or not he believed the religious organization was "actively hiding criminals from law enforcement."
"I think the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has, frankly, not been a good partner in common sense immigration enforcement that the American people voted for and I hope, again, as a devout Catholic, that they'll do better," he emphasized.
Vance was previously an evangelical protestant but converted to Catholicism in 2019. President
Donald Trump reportedly considers himself a nondenominational Christian.
In the days after Trump's inauguration, the commander-in-chief, 78, attended church services where Episcopal bishop Reverand
Mariann Edgar Budde pleaded with him to have "mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now."
The Apprentice alum fired back at the surprising comment during a White House interview via the
Associated Press, saying, "I didn't think it was a good service. They could do much better."
"She brought her church into the world of politics in a very ungracious way. She was nasty in tone and not compelling or smart," he added. "Apart from her inappropriate statements, the service was a very boring and uninspiring one. She is not very good at her job! She and her church owe the public an apology!"
Elsewhere in Vance's interview, he further clarified his stance on people who want to become
American citizens. "This is a very unique country and it was founded by some immigrants and some settlers. But just because we were founded by immigrants, doesn't mean that 240 years later that we have to have the dumbest immigration policy in the world," he said.
"I don't agree that all these
immigrants, or all these refugees, have been properly vetted. In fact, we know that there are cases of people who allegedly were properly vetted and then were literally planning terrorist attacks in our country," the VP stated.
"We absolutely cannot unleash thousands of unvetted people into our country," he continued. "I don't want my children to share a neighborhood with people who are not properly vetted."
