The election of Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost as Pope Leon XIV has been met with a mix of excitement, pride, and surprise by the Catholic community in the United States. And with bewilderment, hope, and even indignation by the American political class and the universe of Make America Great Again led by Donald Trump. The consequences of a first Pontiff from North America cannot be underestimated, nor can the repercussions on a divided country and society that polarizes, labels, and stigmatizes everything.
The United States is the second country with the most cardinals, only behind Italy and ahead of Spain. Television screens were filled on Thursday with parishioners, bishops, and believers in shock, emotional, overwhelmed by the joy and opportunity that this represents in a continent where Protestant tradition has been dominant, but where Catholicism (with Joe Biden, the first president since Kennedy) seems to be experiencing a sweet moment. However, in just a few minutes, the impact of the election was felt more deeply when thousands of people rushed to seek information and scan social media for clues about who the new Pontiff is, what he stands for, and how he thinks. Also, for ammunition to attack if he turned out not to be one of theirs.
President Donald Trump, who a few days ago offended the curia and believers by circulating an image of himself dressed in white from White House accounts, or saying that he would make a great Pope, immediately boasted about the appointment of a Chicago-born individual as the leader of the Catholic Church. "It is a great honor to know that he is the first American Pope. What excitement and what a great honor for our country. I am looking forward to meeting Pope Leon XIV. It will be a very significant moment!" the president stated on his social network, Truth Social.
Moments later, controversies and disputes about the ideology, worldview, and values of Leon XIV, however, dominated the debate. On his social media, Cardinal Prevost has positioned himself in the last decade against the death penalty, firearms, and especially against the immigration policies championed and executed by Trump, which he considers to be far from Christian values, but also American values. His recent tweets, very few in the last two years, are direct or indirect criticisms of the priorities of the White House or the words of Vice President JD Vance, a recent convert to Catholicism, about immigrants and how in his view, religion implies choosing your own over those who come from outside.
He also rejects the actions of the U.S. Administration and its Salvadoran partners. In the past, there are messages highlighting the defense of minorities, prayers for George Floyd, the man who died from police asphyxiation and became an emblem of the Black Lives Matter movement, or warnings about climate change, enough to be condemned by supporters of a more conservative religion.
The appointment has disoriented, for example, the MAGA movement. Breibart News, which gives voice to many of its ideologues, praised that the Pope has always been against abortion and led a "pro-life" group at the University, or that he had taken a stand against the teaching of gender theories in schools in Peru. "The promotion of gender ideology is confusing because it seeks to create genders that do not exist," he said to local media at the time.
"Our Turning Point Action team extracted the voting record of Pope Leon XIV. He is a registered Republican who has voted in Republican primaries when not living abroad. Our data shows that he is a strong Republican and pro-life," celebrated X Charlie Kick, one of the most well-known activists of the Make America Great Again movement on social media. Shortly after, in a video and with a bit more information, he wondered if the messages of "propaganda" or "about open borders" would explain the appointment, speculating that it could all be a maneuver by the Vatican to overshadow Trump and steer Catholics away from his ideological path.
"His name is Robert Prevost. He is the first American Pope. He is anti-Trump, anti-MAGA, pro-open borders, and a total Marxist like Pope Francis. Catholics have nothing good to expect. Just another Marxist puppet in the Vatican," criticized influencer Laura Loomer, one of the queens of conspiracies in the United States and surprisingly close to Trump, in a dozen consecutive tweets. "The new Pope supports undocumented immigrants and the opening of borders and criticized President Trump for using the phrase "bad hombres" to describe violent undocumented immigrants. He considers it a "racist" phrase. Marxist Pope," she added.
The new Pope's tweets have sparked anger among those who did not know him. Those who had him perfectly identified and considered him a papal candidate had actually been making moves in the past two weeks, stirring up controversies that have surrounded him in the past, almost all linked to allegations of sexual abuse within the Church.
Steve Bannon, the great guru of the alt-right, the radical American right, and advisor to Trump, warned more than 10 days ago. In a television interview, he said "that one of the least promising candidates, and unfortunately one of the most progressive, is Cardinal Prevost... he is certainly on the list of candidates," pointing out his "ideological proximity to Francis," his "great experience in Latin America," and the weight of the American Church, one of the highest fundraisers.
A person watches the news of the new Pope's election at the News Corporation headquarters in New York.Michael M. SantiagoGetty Images / Afp
The news even caught his closest friends by surprise, like Father Art Purcaro, a missionary of the Augustinian order who spent time with Prevost in Rome and Chicago. "I am even more surprised than the whole world is," he told CNN. "The Church has chosen a good man, a man of God. Father Robert Hagan, another of his friends for the past 25 years, also admitted to being "in a state of shock, very excited. We are very happy for the Augustinians," describing the new leader of the Church as "a great human being, an instrument of God, and a builder of bridges".
However, it is not lost on anyone that his appointment comes at a time of tension between Washington and a good number of countries due to Trump's isolationist policies. Hagan believes Prevost embodies a different image of the United States. "He represents everything that is good about being American, working for freedom, justice, and opportunity for all people, which are the core values on which this country was founded. He is an instrument, a promoter of all the good things we have in common."