Anti-Democratic, anti-trans Facebook posts of Pope Leo brother draw scrutiny

The oldest brother of newly elected Pope Leo XIV has predicted that the Roman Catholic church’s first-ever US-born leader will strive to be apolitical in his role – which, if that happens, would cut a stark contrast with the papal sibling’s fierce support of far-right American politics.

Facebook posts under the name of Louis Martin “Lou” Prevost, whose youngest brother, Robert Prevost,was recently picked to succeed the late Pope Francis, have come under scrutiny from journalists and social media users as the world seeks hints about what kind of relationship Leo may foster with Donald Trump.

One of the posts from Lou – a resident of Port Charlotte, Florida, which is in a majority Republican county – recirculates a video referring to the Democratic congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, the former US House speaker, as a “drunk [C-word]”.

Another accused Barack Obama and the Democratic party which he led as president from 2009 to 2017 of “longing for the total destruction of our way of life and turning this country into a dictatorship, and a racist one on top of it”.

Yet another post called for Democrats who met with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, after he and Trump argued in the Oval Office about his country’s war with Russia to be arrested on charges of treason. And a separate post shared an anti-LGBTQ+ meme with the text: “Your child isn’t trans – you’re just a shitty parent.”

In interviews that he granted after Leo’s election, Lou has made it a point to say that he and his brother, widely seen as ideologically moderate, have their differences.

Lou told the New York Times that he was conservative, and he and Leo – as the outlet put it – “disagreed on some things”. And, more lightheartedly, Lou described how he rooted for his home town Chicago Cubs baseball team while Leo backed their intracity rivals the White Sox as they grew up there with their parents and their middle brother, John.

Nonetheless, Lou’s attempt to portray himself and Leo as their own men has done little to quell the polarizing reaction the older brother’s Facebook posts have inspired since drawing notice.

Among the newer comments visible on Lou’s account as of Monday was one reading: “Your brother must be soooo embarrassed.” Another of the more polite ones read, “Your comments and language is unbecoming of anyone. Shame on you. Besides it being nasty it’s also factually incorrect. I hope this is not a reflection on the Roman Catholic church.”

Lou, though, had defenders in his corner. One Facebook user on Lou’s page wrote “what the hell is wrong with people” who had gone there to complain about his beliefs. The conservative political website Gateway Pundit exalted him as “a red-blooded American patriot telling it like it is”.

For his part, early indications from Leo have been that he seemingly has been willing to oppose stances held by Trump and his Republican supporters through his two presidencies, which began in 2017 and in January.

Social media activity reportedly linked to Leo, 69, shows he had previously boosted a 2018 statement from a fellow church leader criticizing the Trump administration’s policy of allowing immigration authorities to separate families at the US-Mexico border at the time. He evidently shared a post asking “is your conscience not disturbed” in reference to Kilmar Ábrego García, the man whom the second Trump administration mistakenly deported to a prison in El Salvador.

Meanwhile, in some of his earliest remarks as the Catholic pontiff, Leo invoked a prior call from Francis for the church to be one “that builds bridges”. Such imagery during Francis’s papacy came to be seen as a rebuke of the “build the wall” slogan Trump has frequently used in connection with his administration’s efforts to restrict immigration at Mexico’s border with the US.

Trump, for the record, congratulated Leo over the outcome of the papal election and said he looked forward to meeting him.

Asked by south-west Florida’s ABC Gulf Coast News how he believed his brother’s papacy would compare with that of Francis, Lou Prevost said, “I don’t think there will be a lot of politics involved.”

Lou, 73, added that his younger brother, who had introduced him to Francis at one point, was “more … here’s the rules that have been set – let’s follow them”.

He referred to Francis’s widely publicized efforts for the church, which does not recognize same-sex unions, to be more welcoming to LGBTQ+ people as being “a little more liberal with the transsexuals and the homosexuals and whatnot”.

Lou Prevost did not respond to messages from the Guardian seeking comment. He told Gulf Coast News that he had not spoken to Leo in the immediate aftermath of the pope’s election, figuring his brother must have been exceptionally busy at the time.

The Prevost brothers all reportedly attended Catholic school. John, 71, became a Catholic school principal in their home town. Louis has said he was in the US navy at the time Robert became ordained a priest in 1982.

Before becoming pope, Leo served as the worldwide leader of the Catholic religious order colloquially known as the Augustinians; led a Peruvian diocese; was made cardinal by Francis in September 2023; and headed the Vatican entity in charge of selecting new bishops around the world.