Summary
- Donald Trump to sit in third-tier row at Pope Francis’s funeral
- Italian and Argentine leaders granted front-row seats
- Trump had previously mocked President Biden’s seating at Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral
US President Donald Trump will not be seated in the front row of dignitaries at Pope Francis’s funeral ceremony at St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City on Saturday, as per Vatican protocol. In fact, Trump will not even be in the second row. Instead, he will be placed in the third row, according to The Telegraph.
The seating arrangement comes amid a long history of disagreements between Trump and the late Pope Francis on various issues, ranging from migration to the environment and Gaza. During Trump’s first presidential campaign in 2016, Pope Francis called him “not Christian” for his proposal to build a wall along the US-Mexico border to keep out migrants. Trump responded by calling the Pope’s remarks “disgraceful.”
However, the question remains: is Trump’s seating in the third row a snub by the Vatican, or simply a matter of protocol?
The seating for dignitaries at the Vatican is determined by the alphabetical order of their countries’ names in French. Since the United States is listed as “Etats Unis,” which begins with the letter “E,” Trump will be seated ahead of dignitaries from nearly 130 other countries. However, Italian and Argentine leaders, along with royalty, will take precedence in the seating arrangements, according to Vatican protocol.
In the first row, Argentina’s President Javier Milei, who has been critical of Pope Francis in the past, will sit alongside Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Argentina, the Pope’s home country, and Italy, which recognized Vatican City as a sovereign state in 1929, will be given top seating preference. As the Bishop of Rome, Pope Francis’s native country also holds an important place in the seating hierarchy.
Not long ago, Trump mocked then-US President Joe Biden for sitting in the 14th row at Queen Elizabeth II’s state funeral in 2022, calling it “humiliating” for the United States. Trump claimed that Biden’s seating reflected a lack of respect for America and that, if he were president, he would have been placed in a more prominent position. “In real estate, like in politics and in life, location is everything,” Trump remarked, emphasizing the significance of such symbolic gestures.
Biden will also be attending Pope Francis’s funeral, but according to a Reuters report citing a diplomatic source, he will not be part of the official delegation. As a result, the current US president will be seated farther back, alongside other VIPs.
