Bishop Who Confronted Trump During National Prayer Event Shakes Off His Attack On Her Service: ‘Respectful Response’

Washington Bishop Mariann Budde called President Donald Trump slamming her service where she confronted him over his policies a “respectful response.”

Budde discussed her “final plea” to the president made during the National Prayer Service at the Washington National Cathedral on Tuesday night with CNN’s Erin Burnett.

“I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now,” Budde told Trump during the service. “There are gay, lesbian, and transgender children in Democratic, Republican, and independent families, some who fear for their lives.”

After leaving the service, Trump offered up a negative review of the event.

“Not too exciting, was it? I didn’t think it was a good service. Thank you very much. They can do much better,” Trump said.

Burnett asked about the critique and Budde took it in stride, calling the response “muted” and saying she’s heard far worse responses to her decision to go political from the pulpit.

“It was a respectful response. He didn’t like it. He said so. He said we could do better,” the bishop said. “Some of the other comments I’ve received haven’t been as kind or have been as muted, shall we say. And one of the things I was trying to get across is that we can actually have these conversations in a respectful way.”

Budde said she could not read the “body language” of Trump during the service where he and Vice President JD Vance appeared surprised at Budde’s comments.

“I keep my expectations low whenever I preach, Erin,” she said. “I can’t always measure impact by body language or even what people say afterwards, and so I have to let all of that go. I speak from what I believe I’ve been given to say and let it go from there.”

Trump upped his rhetoric about the service in a Truth Social post, calling Budde’s speech “nasty” and saying she owes an apology to the public.

Watch above via CNN.