Former President Donald Trump is calling out Vice President Kamala Harris for her record of anti-Catholic rhetoric and policy. In a speech last week at Turning Point Action’s Believers Summit, Trump accused Harris and the Democratic Party of targeting American Catholics, quipping that “somebody doesn’t like Catholics in that administration.” Referring to President Joe Biden, Trump added, “I don’t think it’s Biden, because I don’t think he has any idea what the hell he’s doing.”

“I don’t know how a Catholic can vote for the Democrats because they’re after the Catholics almost as much as they’re after me,” Trump stated. “How does a Catholic person vote for a Democrat with what they’re doing to Catholics? I just don’t get it.”

On Wednesday, Trump praised the conservative group CatholicVote for its efforts to expose Harris’s anti-Catholic record. “A large group of Catholics is launching a major Political Campaign against Crazy Kamala Harris. FINALLY!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. He continued, “Catholics are literally being persecuted by this Wack Job, just ask the Knights of Columbus. They say that she is the most Anti-Catholic person ever to run for high office in the U.S. This respected group wants ALL CATHOLICS TO VOTE AGAINST KAMALA, and they are 100% correct.”

Get the latest pro-life news and information on X (Twitter). Follow @LifeNewsHQ

“We’re proud to expose Kamala’s vile hatred of Catholics,” CatholicVote responded on social media. “Having a President who unapologetically brings this hatred to light is needed to combat religious bigotry.”

So what is all that anti-Catholic about Harris’s record?

Abortion

The Catholic Church strongly opposes abortion and condemns the practice as a moral evil. Over recent years, Catholics have increasingly abandoned the pro-abortion Democratic Party and coalesced around the GOP.

Observers say Harris is one of the most radically pro-abortion politicians to ever run for the White House. Her presidential campaign has already been endorsed by major pro-abortion institutions and abortion featured prominently in her first official campaign ad. During her time as vice president, Harris became the highest-ranking government official to visit an abortion facility, launched a pro-abortion “Fight for Our Rights” speaking tour last year, and followed it up with an extended pro-abortion tour this year. She has also argued that promoting abortion does not contradict Christian moral teachings.

Moreover, Harris has been complicit in the Biden administration’s unprecedented abortion advocacy. This includes turning a blind eye to leftist agitation and violence against pro-life Americans in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling, attempting to expand abortion legislation after Roe v. Wade was overturned, accusing pro-life pregnancy resource centers of fraud, forcing American taxpayers to fund abortion travel, trying to “hijack” insurance programs to fund abortion, promoting and funding abortions in foreign nations, co-opting the White House to congratulate and thank abortionists, subverting pro-life legislation to promote or fund abortions, campaigning almost exclusively on abortion, overruling pro-life laws at the state level, celebrating Roe, terrorizing and arresting pro-life advocates (including Catholics like Mark Houck), declaring abortion a “stabilizing treatment” for pregnant women, and weaponizing federal agencies such as the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Health and Human Services to promote or commit abortions.

As a senator, Harris co-sponsored legislation to block pro-life laws at the state level, voted against requiring doctors to provide medical care to babies who survive abortion attempts, and introduced the “Do No Harm” Act, which would have removed conscience protections for Christian doctors and forced them to commit abortions. As California’s attorney general, Harris sponsored legislation to force pregnancy resource centers to advertise for abortion, tried to pressure Hobby Lobby to pay for contraceptive and abortifacient drugs, and aggressively targeted and prosecuted reporter David Daleiden when he produced video evidence of Planned Parenthood harvesting and selling organs from unborn babies.

Mary Szoch, a Catholic and the director of the Center for Human Dignity at Family Research Council, commented to The Washington Stand, “Harris’s views on faith and unborn children could not be more opposed to the teachings of the Catholic Church.” She continued, “Not only does she disagree with the Church, but she wants to ensure that no one who believes and lives Church teaching should be in office — and she wants to ensure that thoSng Catholics

On the Biden-Harris administration’s watch, the FBI targeted and spied on American Catholics. Over the course of 2023, it was revealed that the FBI had infiltrated and spied on who the agency called “radical traditionalist Catholics,” who were also labeled “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists.” The FBI defined “radical traditionalist Catholics” as those who attended the Tridentine Mass, the form of the Catholic Mass celebrated prior to the Second Vatican Council.

As noted, the Biden-Harris administration’s Department of Justice (DOJ) also unjustly targeted Catholic father-of-seven Mark Houck. Alleging violations of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, the FBI raided Houck’s home, armed with automatic rifles and riot gear, and arrested him in front of his wife and children. Although Houck was quickly acquitted at trial, he and his family still suffer financially, emotionally, and psychologically from the DOJ’s actions.

While still in the Senate, Harris harassed Catholic Brian Beuscher after then-President Trump nominated him to serve as a federal judge. During Beuscher’s confirmation hearings, Harris criticized him for his participation in the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal and charitable organization. Harris called the pro-life positions of the Knights “extreme” and called for Beuscher to end his membership with the Knights prior to being appointed to the bench. “She viciously attacked highly qualified judicial nominees simply because they were members of the Knights of Columbus, suggesting that their Catholic faith disqualified them from serving on the federal bench,” Trump said in his speech last week, referring to the confirmation hearing.

As a senator, Harris also promoted the “Equality” Act, which the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) warned would “run roughshod over religious liberty” and inevitably be used to “punish” Americans who refuse to support LGBT ideology.

Trump’s Pledge

In his speech last week, Trump reiterated his previous pledge to form a federal task force to protect American Christians from religious persecution. The former president promised that he would “stop the Biden-Harris administration’s weaponization of law enforcement against Americans of faith” and said that “no longer will the DOJ and the FBI be allowed to target, persecute, or round up Christians or pro-life activists and throw them in jail for living out their religious beliefs.”

He also promised, “From the moment I win the election, I will rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner who has been unjustly victimized by the Biden-Harris regime so we can get them out of prison and back to their families where they belong.”

Referring to his likely Democratic opponent in November’s election, Trump stated, “The radical left ideology Kamala supports is really militantly hostile toward Americans of faith.”

LifeNews Note: S.A. McCarthy writes for the American Spectator, where this column originally appeared.