Don Lemon Blasts Trump Campaign for Mocking Biden With Out-of-Context Quote from The Pope: ‘Every Time You Think That They Have Hit Rock Bottom’

CNN’s Don Lemon called out the Trump campaign after it put out a deceptive smear on 2020 Democratic challenger Joe Biden, using a short clip from his campaign speech to imply he was spaced out. But in fact, Biden was quoting Pope Francis, who was, ironically, admonishing politicians to think deeply about how they can pursue a more noble path than “media spin.”

Lemon noted that Biden is a devout Catholic and then played a clip of Biden speaking to supporters in Georgia on Tuesday. During his speech, Biden went on to quote from one of the Pope’s latest encyclical, which in a not-so-veiled reference to Trump, warned churchgoers against  a “phony populism” spreading around the world.

“Pope Francis warns us against this phony populism that appeals to ‘the basest and most selfish instincts,'” Biden said in the video. “He goes on to say ‘politics is something more noble than posturing, marketing, and media spin. These sew nothing but division, conflict, and a bleak cynicism.’ He said ‘For those that seek to lead, we do well to ask ourselves: Why am I doing this? Why? What is my real aim?'”

Back in the studio, Lemon then explained how that call for a more inspirational approach to politics by the Pope was misused to attack the former vice president.

“And then, well, there is the Trump campaign,” an exasperated Lemon said. “Proving every time you think that they have hit rock bottom, they find a whole new way to go even lower.”

He then showed a tweet from the Trump War Room Twitter account that snipped the last five seconds of Biden quoting the Pope, in what was clearly an attempt to make it look like the Democrat had lost his train of thought.

“Takes the Pope’s words completely out of context. The Pope, who was calling for politics to be noble,” Lemon pointed out.  “What they did is the opposite of noble, deceptively editing his words, trying to make Joe Biden look bad.”

“Seriously, though?” a dismayed Lemon added. “I’m not sure what you would call that, but you can figure it out for yourself.”

“How low can you go.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.