Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde joined “The View” on Wednesday to discuss her “mercy” plea to President Donald Trump at a prayer service this week, saying it was impossible for her viral message not to be politicized.
Co-host Sara Haines asked if she believed her message was being “misconstrued” or “politicized.”
“I think if you read what I said, I mean, how could it not be politicized, right? We’re in a hyper-political climate. One of the things I caution about is the culture of contempt in which we live that immediately rushes to the worst possible interpretations of what people are saying and to put them in categories such as the ones you just described,” Budde responded.
Budde asked the president to have “mercy” on the LGBT community and immigrants during the prayer service on Tuesday. Trump and Vice President JD Vance, along with their spouses, listened stone-faced as Budde made her remarks.
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“That’s part of the air we breathe now, and I was trying to speak a truth that I felt needed to be said, but to do it as respectful and kind a way as I could. And also to bring other voices into the conversation, which voices that had not been heard in the public space for some time,” Budde added.
Co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin asked Budde whether her sentiment would have had more impact in a one-on-one setting with Trump and whether she had that opportunity.
“I’ve never been invited for a one-on-one conversation with President Trump. I would welcome that opportunity,” Budde said. “I have no idea how that would go. I can assure him and everyone listening that I would be as respectful as I would with any person, and certainly of his office, for which I have a great deal of respect, but the invitation would have to come from him.”
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Budde’s comments drew considerable attention given the venue.
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“Let me make one final plea, Mr. President,” she said on Tuesday. “In the name of our God, I ask you 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 went on to say that “the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors.”
Afterward, Trump told reporters he didn’t care for the service.
Trump also sharply criticized Budde in a post on Truth Social.
“The so-called Bishop who spoke at the National Prayer Service on Tuesday morning was a Radical Left hard line Trump hater. She brought her church into the World of politics in a very ungracious way,” he wrote.
Fox News’ Danielle Wallace and Alex Nitzberg contributed to this report.
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