Gavin Newsom Bashes Trump For Questioning How People Of Faith Can Vote Democrat At National Prayer Breakfast

California Governor Gavin Newsom criticized President Donald Trump for questioning during an appearance at the bipartisan National Prayer Breakfast how people of faith can vote for a Democrat.

Trump's comments came during a rambling 75-minute speech at the Washington Hilton in D.C. He falsely alleged Democrats "cheat" in elections and reiterated his call for voter identification laws after his recent remarks about having Republicans "take over the voting" in at least 15 states.

Trump said:

“I don’t know how a person of faith can vote for a Democrat. I really don’t. And I know we have some here today. I don’t know why they’re here because they certainly don’t give us their vote. I know we're certainly not convincing them to vote for a little thing called voter ID."

"It polls at 97 percent and even the people, the voters are at 82 percent for voter ID but the leaders don't want to approve. They said they'll strike, that they won't allow it to happen." ...

"It's called voter identification and you go to the polls and you say, 'I'm so-and-so and I live in the country and here, I can vote.' They say that's not allowed. They do something to vote: They cheat, but let's get on to another subject."

You can hear what he said in the video below.

Religious affiliation in the United States continues to track closely with party identification.

White Protestants and Catholics skew Republican, with a majority of Protestants—and an overwhelming share of white evangelicals—registered with the GOP. Black Protestants, by contrast, are overwhelmingly Democratic, as are nearly half of Hispanic Protestants. Protestants remain the country’s largest religious bloc.

Catholics are more evenly divided, though white Catholics lean Republican, while Catholics overall—particularly Hispanic Catholics—are more likely to be registered Democrats.

Meanwhile, Americans who do not identify with any religion form one of the Democratic Party’s strongest constituencies. As the population of religiously-unaffiliated voters has grown, so too has their alignment with Democrats, with roughly 7 in 10 identifying with or leaning toward the party, compared with just over a quarter who align with Republicans.

Trump's remarks quickly caught the attention of Newsom, who responded:

"An absolute fraud and disgrace."

You can see his post below.

Many concurred.

Trump has long courted Christian voters, insisting they should not align themselves with Democrats and their priorities.

He previously told attendees at a conservative Christian event that they "won’t have to vote anymore" if he were elected, stating, "It’ll be fixed so good, you’re not going to have to vote."

Despite his adultery, dishonesty, criminal behavior, and other moral failings, Trump claims to be a Christian and has actively sought and received the support of the evangelical community. He has delivered on his pledges to appoint conservative Christian judges to senior positions, a move that has been instrumental in restricting women’s reproductive rights and solidifying his base.

During last year's National Prayer Breakfast, he announced he'd established a White House "Faith Office" while pledging to "eradicate anti-Christian bias." He claimed that "the mission of this task force will be to immediately halt all forms of anti-Christian targeting and discrimination within the federal government including in the DOJ, the IRS, the FBI, and other agencies."

He assured those in attendance that the task force "will fully prosecute anti-Christian violence and vandalism in our society and to move heaven and earth to defend the rights of Christians and religious believers nationwide."