Donald Trump has said he hopes to go to heaven, but revealed he “hates” his enemies and cannot forgive them.
During a CBS 60 Minutes interview, interviewer Ross Douthat asked the US president about surviving multiple assassination attempts, his subsequent outlook on mortality and what would happen to him after he dies.
Mr Trump said: “You mean where I go? Well, I’m a religious person, so in theory, I go to heaven.”
“Do you think you’re going to heaven?” Douthat followed-up, to which President Trump said “I hope so, I don’t want to go to hell.”
Douthat, a conservative columnist and Roman Catholic, then asked the president about whether he could forgive his political enemies. He referred to a service honouring Charlie Kirk, where his widow Erika shared a Christian message of forgiveness while Trump said he “hates” his opponents.
Douthat asked: “You’re entering the next life, and all you have to do to enter paradise is feel love and forgiveness for James Comey, Nancy Pelosi, anyone who you have expressed hate for over the years. Do you think you can do it?”
“Well then I wouldn’t be real, would I? Sure, the easy answer to that is ‘oh yes, I could forgive’...”, the president responds before Douthat interrupts and says “no I don’t think that’s an easy question at all.” Trump then reiterates how his opponents were “extremely dishonest, very bad people”.
“Is the answer no, then?”, Douthat asks to which Trump replies “the answer is no, I want to be honest.”
“Before the judgement throne of God?”
“Before the judgement - no, I think they were very bad people. And I dislike, I can use the word hate, I do hate some of my enemies, I think they’ve been terrible, look what they’ve put me through.”
Douthat explains how Trump has had “the most charmed and remarkable life of any American in my lifetime. And you are telling me you couldn’t find it in your heart to forgive some of your enemies? After all that’s been given to you?”
“Can I be honest? I probably cannot do that, no. Because I do hate some of my enemies and I always will,” the president concluded.
Questions about forgiveness and life after death came at the end of the sit-down interview, in which the president discussed why the Republicans lost the midterm elections and how he was planning a “tremendous number of pardons” for his supporters upon leaving office.