Panel: Why did Trump post an image depicting himself as Jesus?

[0:00] An uncharacteristic move by President Trump. [0:03] After significant blowback from both the left and the right, [0:06] he's now deleted this AI-generated post depicting himself as Jesus. [0:10] But according to him, that isn't the likeness of Jesus, [0:13] and he's surprised that anyone would think otherwise. [0:16] I just heard about it, and I said, how did they come up with that? [0:20] It's supposed to be me as a doctor making people better. [0:24] But tonight, Vice President J.D. Vance had a different explanation. [0:27] He said Trump is just trying to be funny. [0:29] I think the president was posting a joke, and of course he took it down [0:32] because he recognized that a lot of people weren't understanding his humor in that case. [0:38] Father Edward Beck is here with us at the table. [0:41] Father Beck, is this a funny joke? [0:44] It seems like most people didn't take it that way. [0:47] Well, I think rightly so. [0:49] What doctor have you ever seen with light rays coming out of his hands to heal someone [0:55] and rays from heaven coming down blessing him [0:59] in red and white garments? [1:01] I mean, the president, I think, is being disingenuous, quite frankly, [1:07] by saying he thinks it was a doctor's image he was posting. [1:12] There's no Red Cross image in the photograph. [1:15] There's an image of a nurse in a blue uniform, but nothing about the Red Cross. [1:21] So I just think all of his comments did not follow what everybody else saw. [1:25] And for J.D. Vance to say it was simply him being humorous, I think, well, which was it? [1:31] If he was trying to be humorous, most people didn't get it. [1:35] So basically we're blaming people for not getting his humor and the liberal media for not getting it? [1:43] I just think you always put the blame somewhere else. [1:45] But why not just say, look, I made a mistake. [1:47] I posted the wrong thing. [1:49] I'm sorry. [1:49] I shouldn't have done it. [1:50] I just think that would be more reasonable. [1:52] He deleted it, but then lied about it. [1:55] That's not who he is. [1:56] I mean, I think we have to get to the point where we're like, when are the lies enough lies? [2:00] When do the people of America who support this man say, this is enough lies? [2:04] Like, quite clearly, everyone who's ever dressed up for Halloween knows if you're a doctor, [2:07] you put on a white coat and a stethoscope. [2:09] Like, that's the doctor costume, not the Jesus costume, which is what Donald Trump put himself out being. [2:14] And it's putting himself in the place of God, not with God, in the place of God. [2:17] I think the bigger issue here is that Trump's behavior from the whole week is that he's not mentally fit to be in this position right now. [2:26] He threatened 90 million people with instantaneous death. [2:30] He's terrorizing the world. [2:31] He's ruining the economy. [2:34] He basically said, we're going to get rid of a 6,000-year-old civilization. [2:37] And then he went to an ultimate fighting championship game to wave at people, right? [2:41] Like, we can't pretend that this is okay, that America is the good guy in this situation. [2:46] It's no longer even pretending that we represent freedom and justice or democracy in the world [2:51] when we have this one man with unquestioned, unchecked power acting however he wants, [2:56] and then we try and make excuses for it after the fact. [2:59] It's too much, and we have to stop. [3:01] So, Lee is not the only person describing Trump's behavior recently as erratic. [3:06] And the Times put it all together in a piece that says, [3:10] Trump's erratic behavior and extreme comments revive mental health debate [3:13] as the former president threatens to wipe out Iran, attacks the Pope. [3:17] Even some former allies and advisors are questioning whether he's grown increasingly unbalanced, [3:22] describing him as lunatic and clearly insane. [3:26] And look, let's pretend that it's not Trump. [3:30] If someone that you loved who was in a position of power, [3:34] like a CEO or something, posted something like that, [3:39] people would be calling and asking, are you okay? [3:41] Well, I think the reason Trump said that is because the person that originally posted it [3:46] was, I think, February 6th, and he actually said he posted it [3:49] because Trump is the doctor for the country. [3:52] And that's why he posted it out there. [3:53] Now, the image is obviously a problem, which is why President Trump pulled it down. [3:57] But I believe President Trump probably didn't think of it as being Jesus at the time. [4:02] He saw it as, oh, I'm healing the country, which is what the... [4:04] Do you believe that he was depicting himself as a doctor? [4:07] You know, I believe, I definitely believe... [4:08] Wait, Hal, you believe that he was depicting himself as a doctor? [4:11] Well, that's what the original post was about. [4:13] And so Trump retweeted it. [4:14] No, I believe, because I don't think Donald Trump knows who Jesus is. [4:18] So I honestly believe that he was confused. [4:22] I mean, the fact that people can't call a spade a spade, like, this was sacrilegious. [4:28] I mean, there were people who gave Barack Obama hell for a tan suit and a selfie stick. [4:32] And you have somebody out here who's mocking Jesus Christ and the Republican Party, GOP, [4:38] they think they're God's only party anyway. [4:40] They simply can't say our president messed up. [4:44] And then when Riley Gaines, who I don't agree with on much or nothing, [4:47] Jason Whitlock, who I don't agree with on absolutely anything, [4:50] when they had the audacity to come out and chastise the president of the United States, [4:54] he chastises them back. [4:55] Yeah, but he pulled it down. [4:56] When you say he won't admit it, he did pull it back down. [4:59] But who is in charge of the man who's in charge of the free world if he can put out things and then be like, [5:04] whoops, we can't have someone in charge who can do that. [5:07] He needs to at least have a team around him that can stop him from putting up the wrong thing. [5:12] He's the president of the United States who can put whatever he wants up. [5:14] You're not in charge. [5:15] You can't tell him what to do. [5:15] That's the attitude in the White House. [5:17] But that's what he can. [5:18] No, go ahead. [5:18] That's the problem. [5:19] No, go ahead. [5:20] I'm just confused as to what the New York Times is identifying as being odd behavior here. [5:38] I mean, this is precisely how he's behaved for the last eight years, ten years. [5:42] If you ask Republican voters, back in the first term, the first thing they tell you they don't like about Donald Trump is the tweets back when it was Twitter. [5:48] The tweets. [5:49] You can't count on 15 hands how many times his social media has gotten him in trouble, and yet he can persist. [5:54] But don't you think on the... [5:56] No, it's not okay. [5:57] It's just a feature of how he is. [5:59] And I wish they had a more disciplined commshaft. [6:01] I think you're right. [6:02] Like, look, there was a polling earlier this year. [6:05] 61% say that Trump doesn't share their values. [6:08] 64% say he does not have the right temperament to be president. [6:13] So you're right. [6:14] Americans see him for who he is. [6:16] But I think the issue... [6:17] Republicans don't like that, too. [6:18] The issue right now is on the importance of the things that he's sending these messages about. [6:25] It's not just calling his political opponents' names. [6:28] He's threatening to wipe out a civilization in the middle of a war. [6:32] And then he's getting into a tit-for-tat, which we'll talk more about in a little bit, with the Pope and then sending out an image that even his own supporters are saying, don't do that. [6:46] I mean, Riley Gaines' comment was, a little humility would serve him well. [6:49] God shall not be mocked. [6:52] It's the why. [6:54] It's the stuff that he's doing it on that makes a difference. [6:56] I do think there's a little... [6:58] Let me just let Bill respond, please. [6:59] I actually don't have much to say. [7:01] I think everybody's right. [7:02] I think Riley Gaines is right that we wish the president would exercise a little bit more discretion. [7:06] He cannot do that. [7:07] He refuses to do that. [7:08] And then folks like J.D. Vance come around and say, well, this is what's best about him. [7:11] It does fuel his ego. [7:13] But I also think that we're not clearly acknowledging the fact that it's getting worse. [7:17] And I had a great aunt, Jenny Marie. [7:19] She was the matriarch of our family. [7:21] And she was 88 years old and still driving. [7:23] And then she used to come to church and park in the front. [7:25] And then the day she hit the pastor's car, my dad had to go take away the keys, right? [7:30] Because it just progressively got worse. [7:33] Is this going to be an Article 25 discussion again? [7:35] You guys have been talking about Article 25. [7:36] No, no, no. [7:37] It's never happened. [7:37] We all know that's not happening. [7:39] So I have two concerns. [7:40] One is that the president, I believe, lacks discernment. [7:42] And I think that's getting worse. [7:43] The second thing is, you won't call a spade a spade. [7:46] And the fact that if you can't call what he did sacrilegious, which is clearly the definition [7:51] of sacrilegious, I think that would be my second problem. [7:53] Well, obviously, I wouldn't have posted it out there. [7:55] And I think President Trump realized he shouldn't have pulled it down. [7:57] But can you be critical of him? [7:59] Sure. [8:00] I don't think you should have posted it. [8:01] But why not apologize? [8:02] Why not admit I did something wrong? [8:04] That's a very good question. [8:05] I think part of it is, in politics, when you start apologizing, you run into problems. [8:09] And I think that's the issue. [8:10] It certainly is. [8:11] Okay, just to be clear. [8:12] But in Christianity, when you start apologizing, you actually put a hand on it. [8:15] Just to be clear, it is not true that in politics, when you apologize, things start [8:21] to go wrong. [8:21] That the only person who believes that is Donald Trump. [8:24] And he is wrong about that. [8:26] In politics, it is okay to acknowledge mistakes. [8:30] That's actually what most politicians do. [8:32] The fact that Trump doesn't do it, it's not a virtue, pal. [8:39] I mean, it's not a virtue. [8:40] And why, by the way, is it that Trump needs to post something first, see the backlash, [8:45] to realize that it was wrong? [8:47] Well, as was said, he's been posting now for 12 years. [8:51] Yeah, but does he have the judgment to know that it's wrong before he posts it? [8:56] I think he does. [8:57] I mean, this was done at, what, 3 in the morning, I think? [8:59] So what was going on at 3 in the morning at the White House? [9:02] He just thinks it's cool. [9:03] Like, he posts this thing where he's dressed up as Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now, going [9:08] to war with Chicago. [9:09] He thinks it's cool. [9:10] He doesn't actually. [9:11] But also at 4 a.m. [9:13] His fans shouldn't tell him. [9:13] But also at 4 a.m. on Easter Sunday, he was also posting about committing a genocide. [9:18] Like, you can't decouple them. [9:21] And what all I'm saying is, when you look at them together, and when you look at them [9:24] not in exclusivity, but together, you have a president of the United States who is getting [9:29] older by the day. [9:29] I really think we should make a distinction between being provocative and blasphemous [9:35] with making threats against an adversary in war that you've interpreted to mean breaking [9:39] the nuclear trap. [9:40] I will take the fact that she called it blasphemous, so I'll take a win.