President Donald Trump is not a role model for young people, according to Republican Sen. James Lankford.
“I always look for a president who can be a role model,” he said during a recent interview on CBS News’Face the Nation. “I don’t think that President Trump, as a person, is a role model for a lot of different youth. That’s just me personally.”
“I don’t like the way that he tweets,” the Oklahoma politician continued. “Some of the things that he says, his word choices at times are not my word choices.”
Lankford’s criticism of Trump was discussed during an interview about a weekly Senate prayer group that comes together to explore bipartisanship and faith.
Though he applauded Trump’s pro-life policy stance and said he works together with the president on issues they agree on, Lankford said he doesn’t approve of Trump’s demeanor on social media.
“I’ll tell you that praying for the president is probably one of the greatest spiritual challenges I’ve had to work through in my life,” he said. “For people of faith, it’s a bit of a conundrum at times.”
Evangelical Christians have been in the midst of a tug-of-war over Trump in recent weeks, following aChristianity Todayeditorialthat called for the president’s removal from office over his impeachment.
Trump fanned the flames, calling the popular religious publication a “far-left “magazine and criticizing their anti-Trump stance. “No President has done more for the Evangelical community, and it’s not even close, You’ll not get anything from those Dems on stage,” Trumptweeted.
Christian Post, another faith-based publication, wrote apro-Trump editorialin response, leading to editor Napp Nazworth leaving the religious news outlet.
“They’ve chosen to represent a narrow (and shrinking) slice of Christianity,” Nazworthwroteon Twitter, announcing his departure. “That might be a good business decision, short term at least. But it’s bad for Democracy, and bad for the Gospel.”
Sen. James Lankford.CBS
Trump has been characteristically loud through December, as he became the third president in American history to ever be impeached. The president wrote an unprecedented scathing letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and has continued to attack her and the Democratic party on social media over his impeachment in mid-December.
“He comes across with more New York City swagger than I do from the Midwest,” Lankford said during theFace the Nationinterview. “Definitely not the way that I’m raising my kids.”
Lankford said it’s been a “grand challenge” to work with Trump, as a person of faith. “There are policy areas that we agree on. And when we agree on those things, we work on those things together,” he said. “But it’s also been a grand challenge to be able to say for a person of faith, for a person who believes that there’s a right way to go on things, I wish that he was more a role model in those areas.”
source: people.com
