Papal peacemaker? Making nice with Pope Leo is Marco Rubio’s latest job

WASHINGTON – Add papal peacemaker to Marco Rubio’s ever-growing list of roles.

PresidentDonaldTrump has been throwing broadsides at Pope Leo XIV, ripping him as “weak” on crime and nuclear weapons and accusing the first American-born pontiff of “endangering” Catholics with his opposition to the Iran war.

Send in the nation’s chief diplomat, a practicing Catholic, who's meeting with Leo on May 7, for a potential reset in relations.

Rubio insists his visit to the Vatican is not about making nice with the pope. The secretary of state says they have urgent matters to discuss such as humanitarian aid to Cuba and the persecution of Christians.

Yet, a potential political problem of Trump’s own making hangs over the visit, as the president skewers the leader of the largest religious denomination in the United States and a bellwether voting bloc ahead of the midterm elections.

“It’s an unnecessary fight among a key voter group,” said Republican pollster Brent Buchanan, founder of the Washington, DC-based firm Cygnal.

Rubio’s trip to see the pontiff provides an opportunity to mend a rift that could have political implications for his party. He is the most senior U.S. official to visit the Vatican since Trump began slamming the leader of a religion practiced by roughly one fifth of U.S. adults.

“No matter what the administration says, this is absolutely a reset effort and there's no mistake that Rubio was the one they sent,” said “Letters from Leo” publisher and former Obama Catholic outreach director Christopher Hale.

The president has kept up his criticism of Leo, jabbing the pope in a May 4 interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on the eve of Rubio’s visit. Trump accused Leo of being “OK” with Iran having a nuclear weapon, something the pope hasn’t endorsed.

“I think he’s endangering a lot of Catholics, and a lot of people,” Trump told Hewitt of Leo’s rhetoric around the war.

Asked during a May 6 event in the Oval Office what message he wants Rubio to deliver to the pope, Trump said his "only message" is that Iran can't get a nuclear bomb.

The ongoing attacks could complicate any effort by Rubio to reach a détente with the religious leader, who is also a head of state.

Leo has said he doesn’t fear the administration “or speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel." 

“If someone wants to criticize me for proclaiming the Gospel, let him do so truthfully,” he told reporters May 5.

Catholics cringe over President Trump's attacks

Catholics make up a huge voting bloc, one that Trump carried in 2016, when he first won the presidency, and swung to Joe Biden, who’s Catholic, in 2020 when Trump lost his reelection campaign. Trump won Catholics, and the White House, back in 2024, according to exit surveys and polls. 

White Catholics, who are more likely to support Republicans than Hispanic Catholics, fueled Trump’s support.

Buchanan, the pollster, said Catholic backing for Republicans on the generic congressional ballot dropped between March and April of 2026 in surveys he conducted, with more now saying they are unsure which party to favor. He was hesitant to draw conclusions without more data but noted that midterm elections are about which party’s base is more fired up.

Any drop in Catholic support would be a concern for Republicans heading into what is expected to be a tough midterm election for the president’s party.

Kristan Hawkins, the president of the conservative Students for Life group and a member of the Catholics for Trump advisory board during the 2020 presidential election, said Trump should focus on issues such as abortion that fire up the conservative base heading into the November midterms.

“He needs to be picking a fight with Planned Parenthood, not the Holy Father,” Hawkins said.

While Trump’s approval rating has dropped since the start of the Iran war, the pope remains popular, according to a Reuters/Ipsos survey released last month. The poll found that 60% of Americans approve of Leo, compared to just 36% who say the same of Trump.

When Trump’s “dustup” with the pope began, Catholics “cringed a bit, there’s no question,” said T.W. Arrighi, a GOP consultant who’s Catholic.

But Arrighi, a former press secretary for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said he does not think the dispute will dissuade swing voters from backing GOP candidates.

“If there is a group of people who are Catholic who are no longer going to support Republicans because Donald Trump took a shot at Leo, I’d love to meet those people,” he said. “I feel like those people would have left long ago.”

But the pope tussle is not the only reason Trump has come under criticism in recent weeks by some religious conservatives: He also shared a widely condemned, and now-deleted, Christ-like image of himself on social media. Trump posted the image the same day he attacked Leo, only the AI image came down.

Continuing to fight with the pope can only hurt Trump in the midterms, University of Notre Dame political science professor Daniel Philpott said.

“Conservative and Mass-going Catholics, the ones most likely to vote for him, do not like that the president is attacking a pope whom they respect not only for his office but also for the holiness and judiciousness of this pope,” he said.

Marco Rubio takes the wheel

Enter Rubio, who is “tactful,” good at reading a room and “plays really well with others,” Arrighi said.

“The president recognizes when people make him look good and Rubio consistently makes him look good,” he added.

A one-time presidential rival to Trump who said he couldn’t be trusted with the nation’s nuclear codes, Rubio has become one of the most powerful figures in his second administration. 

“Marco’s been fantastic,” Trump said in January at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, imploring him to stand for a round of applause. “He’s going to go down as the best secretary of state.”

Trump’s routine praise of Rubio’s performance has raised speculation that the Florida former senator could run for president again. Rubio has shot down those questions, throwing his support behind Vice President JD Vance and saying he’s focused on doing a good job as America’s chief diplomat.

Vance is also Catholic and has been outspoken in defending Trump and pushing back on the pope. Rubio has kept his thoughts on the church "more close to the chest," Arrighi noted. Support from Catholic voters would be key for either man if they ran for president. Both attended the pope's inaugural mass last year.

His potential political ambitions aside, Rubio has incentive to seek good relations with the Vatican, both diplomatically and personally, as a devout member of the faith. The Catholic Church is a major force in providing humanitarian aid to Cuba and other countries around the world. 

At a May 5 briefing with reporters at the White House, Rubio said that he and Leo also have shared concerns about religious freedom in Africa, a continent from which Leo just returned. 

“So we have a lot to talk about with them, and I engage with them quite a bit on that front,” Rubio said. “The trip is really not tied to anything other than the fact that it would be normal for us to engage with them and other secretary of states have done that in the past.”

Papal peacemaker is a natural fit for Rubio, who also serves as Trump’s national security adviser and the director of the National Archives, allies of the White House agreed.

“We have all seen that there is no job that Secretary of State Rubio cannot do,” said Hawkins, the anti-abortion activist.