As President Donald Trump ordered federal troops into Chicago to assist with deportation efforts, immigrants and their advocates found an ally in Pope Leo XIV. A native of the city, the new pope urged U.S. bishops to confront the government’s escalating targeting of migrants.
After a private audience with Catholic leaders from El Paso, Texas, at the Vatican, on Oct. 8, Leo said he would like the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to issue a formal statement. His appeal followed recent comments questioning the consistency of some American Catholics’ moral stances: “Someone who says that ‘I’m against abortion, but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States,’ I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”
Alongside Bishop of El Paso Mark J. Seitz, Hope Border Institute, a grassroots organization rooted in Catholic social teaching, presented the pope with a stack of letters from immigrant community members. The letters expressed both the worries and hopes of migrants in today’s political climate and were received with emotion, said Astrid Liden, Hope’s communications officer.
“When we walked in the room, introduced ourselves and said what we were doing, it seemed like he didn’t need a background or explainer on the issue,” Liden said. “I think being an American pope, and especially an American pope who has worked in Latin America with migrant communities in Peru, he very much knows the reality. He was really attentive to hearing the stories, which I think was beautiful.”
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While many U.S. bishops have spoken out for immigrants in their own dioceses, Liden said Pope Leo broadened the conversation, underscoring the need for the U.S. church to present a united stance.
READ MORE: Can Pope Leo Restore the Genius of American Catholicism?
According to a February report by the Pew Research Center, Catholics are almost twice as likely as Americans of other religions (and those with no religion) to say the country’s growing immigrant population has been a change for the worse. While 41% of U.S. Catholics hold this belief, 33% believe it is a change for the better and 25% think it hasn’t made much of a difference.
Massimo Faggioli, professor at Trinity College Dublin who studies culture and politics within U.S. Catholicism, said the church’s current split over immigration marks a significant shift.
For most of American history, the U.S. Catholic Church saw itself as a church of immigrants—Irish, Italian, Polish—making support for immigration almost instinctive across party lines, Faggioli said. But in the past decade, he said, a growing number of Catholics on the Right have begun to view the Church as historically native and integral to America.
“It’s a big change in their self-understanding,” Faggioli said. “Because if you see yourself as a native, you see the others as migrants who don’t belong.”
Other factors have deepened the divide, he added: Some Catholics openly dismissing papal authority under Pope Francis, the rise of Catholic political figures like Vice President JD Vance framing anti-immigration policies in religious terms, and the scale of global migration today—far larger and more religiously diverse than in the past.
But while Trump felt comfortable criticizing Pope Francis, Faggioli said he believes Pope Leo’s American identity makes him harder to dismiss.
“They cannot say anymore, ‘He doesn’t like America, he’s not American, he hates us.’ That argument is not usable anymore,” Faggioli said. “That doesn’t mean what he says will change legislation, but the first thing I’m curious to see is if it changes American Catholicism.”
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Conservative group CatholicVote stands with the pope in recognizing a living presence of the Lord within migrants, president Kelsey Reinhardt said in a statement to Sojourners.
Yet, she added that Catholic teaching affirms that charity is never opposed to order, stressing that policy must respect both the dignity of the immigrant and the legitimacy of national sovereignty.
“In that light, we cannot pretend that previous administrations upheld this balance. A failure to secure the border, to enforce laws or to ensure safe and legal processes is not mercy—it is neglect. A truly Catholic vision demands more: a system that protects the vulnerable, honors the law and preserves the moral fabric of the nation,” Reinhardt said.
Liden, meanwhile, said she hopes Pope Leo’s comments will remind Catholics who support mass deportation and the federal government's increasing hostility why the Church teaches what it does: Every human being has a right to exist and live a dignified life.
“It’s important to note that the Church and our response as Christians, we’re not limited to a border,” Liden said. “I think that’s a beautiful thing.”
“It’s important to note that the Church and our response as Christians, we’re not limited to a border.” — Astrid Liden
Naomi Taxay is a Northwestern University junior currently reporting on immigration and demographics in Washington, D.C., for the Medill News Service.
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