Cardinal Dolan rips Bannon for Catholic Church immigration remarks

Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York is firing back at Stephen Bannon for his “preposterous” claims that the Catholic Church only preaches and practices acceptance of immigrants in order to fill its pews and reap financial rewards. 

“I don’t really care to go into what I think is a preposterous and rather insulting statement that the only reason we bishops care for immigrants is for the economic — because we want to fill our churches and get more money. That’s insulting and that’s just so ridiculous that it doesn’t merit a comment,” Dolan said on Sirius XM’s “Connect with the Catholic Channel.”

The former White House chief strategist went after the church in a new interview, saying it is “terrible about” immigration and only believes in opening their doors to immigrants because they have “economic interests” in “unlimited illegal immigration.”

“You know why? Because [they have been] unable to really, to come to grips with the problems in the church. They need illegal aliens. They need illegal aliens to fill the churches. It’s obvious on the face of it,” Bannon told ”60 Minutes” host Charlie Rose, after the reporter pointed out that Dolan opposed President Trump’s decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. 

Dolan said Catholics stand by this belief because it is a “Biblical mandate” for everyone to be treated “dignity and respect.”

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops also responded to Bannon’s remarks on Thursday, calling the nationalist ideologue’s comments “absurd.”

“Our pro-immigration stance is based on fidelity to God’s word and honors the American dream. For anyone to suggest that it is out of sordid motives of statistics or financial gain is outrageous and insulting,” James Rogers, chief communications officer for the group, said in a statement.

“This isn’t Catholic partisanship. The Bible is clear, welcoming immigrants is indispensable to our faith.”

Bannon returned to Breitbart News last month after leaving his White House role.

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FBI director: No ‘whiff of interference’ on Russia probe

FBI Director Christopher Wray brushed off concerns Thursday that the Trump administration had interfered with the special counsel’s Russia probe.

“I can say very confidently that I haven’t detected any whiff of interference with that investigation,” said Wray, in his first public appearance since taking over the bureau.

His comments came at the Intelligence and National Security Summit in Washington, D.C., during an onstage interview between The Washington Post’s David Ignatius and six officials from major U.S. intelligence agencies.

Special counsel Robert Mueller was tapped to investigate potential ties between the Trump campaign and Moscow’s efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election. His probe, though, is also looking into whether President Trump obstructed justice, in particular by firing James Comey as FBI director.

At Thursday’s event, Wray went on to say that he has so far found no reason to doubt the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia interfered in the election. He also urged lawmakers to reauthorize Section 702, a rule allowing the National Security Agency to intercept communications between U.S. citizens and noncitizens outside the U.S.

Adm. Mike Rogers, the head of both the NSA and Cyber Command, said he lobbied Vice President Pence directly about Section 207, which expires at year’s end.

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