Donald Trump said he would ‘like to be pope’ ahead of a rally to celebrate his first 100 days in office, which contained predictable references to fake news and rigged elections.
On Tuesday, the president addressed thousands of supporters in Michigan, to mark 100 days since his inauguration, a period which he labelled the “most successful first 100 days of any administration in the history of our country.”
Speaking before the rally, with a ‘Gulf of America’ cap in hand, Trump was asked by a reporter outside the White House for his thoughts on who the next pope should be.
Responding, he jokingly said: “As pope? I’d like to be pope. That would be my number one choice.”
Trump then added that he doesn’t really have a preference on who the next pontiff is following the passing of Pope Francis last week.
During the Michigan rally, Trump covered a range of topics, from his ‘first buddy’ Elon Musk to the group chat-loving secretary of defence Pete Hegseth.
Trump claimed that on election night last November, Musk had predicted he would win the election.
He said: “Elon Musk and, I was sitting with Dana White and Elon Musk and I’m watching the numbers and we’re winning so easily and all of a sudden they flatlined.”
After saying he had started to think the Democrats were rigging the election, he continued: “He [Musk] goes, ‘No, you’re going to win, you just don’t know it yet.'”
Moving onto the subject of Hegseth, Trump dismissed stories about the defence secretary twice leaking top secret war plans in a Signal group chat as ‘fake news.’
“A person that I, number one, I have so much confidence in them. They, the fake news, is after him… but he’s a tough cookie. They don’t know how tough he is. Secretary Hegseth,” he said.
Elsewhere in the speech, Trump predictably dismissed polls showing declining support for him, claiming they polls “interview far more Democrats.”
He went on to label his first 100 days in office as “the most successful of any administration in the history of the US”, adding that the start of his second term was a “revolution of common sense.”
Trump’s 100 days at the start of his second stint as president has seen him tank the global stock market with his ‘liberation day’ tariffs, spout fake claims about Ukraine starting its war with Russia, and being universally condemned for comments calling for the US to occupy Gaza.