04/18/2026
Trump attacked the Pope. Then he cut $11 million from a Catholic charity for migrant children.
Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Miami has housed and cared for unaccompanied migrant children since the 1960s. Children who arrived in the United States alone, without parents, without guardians, with nobody. For more than six decades, this organization has been the one that catches them.
The Trump administration just canceled their $11 million federal contract. The program will be forced to shut down within three months.
The Archbishop of Miami, Thomas Wenski, called it "baffling" that the government would destroy a program "it would be hard-pressed to replicate at the level of competence" the church has demonstrated.
He wrote in the Miami Herald that the program has "served as a model for other agencies throughout the country" and that its "track record in serving this vulnerable population is unmatched."
Nobody knows what happens to the children currently in Catholic Charities' care when the program closes. Robert Latham of the University of Miami Law School's Children and Youth Law Clinic said relocating them could be "incredibly psychologically harmful."
"For little kids, moving repeatedly creates bonding issues and destroys the sense of both self and community," Latham said. "They don't know who they are and where they will be from day to day."
Now look at the timeline. Trump called the Pope "WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy." He posted an AI image of himself as Jesus, then deleted it. He said the Pope should be "thankful" because "if I wasn't in the White House, Leo wouldn't be in the Vatican."
The Pope responded: "I have no fear of the Trump administration." Then Trump's government pulled $11 million from a Catholic program that serves children.
The administration says it's because the number of unaccompanied minors in care has dropped. But the Archbishop's point stands: even with fewer children, you don't destroy a 60-year-old program that no one else can replicate. Not unless the point is punishment.
He attacked the Pope with words. Now he's attacking the Church with funding cuts. And the people paying the price are children who showed up in this country alone.
