Donald Trump was asked a simple question on 60 Minutes: could he forgive his enemies if that was the price of getting into heaven? He said no. Then he said it again, in front of the whole country. “I do hate some of my enemies and I always will,” the Republican president told CBS.
The Question
Ross Douthat sat down with Trump at the White House on Friday. It was his first sit-down interview since Republicans lost the House and the Senate on Tuesday. Near the end, Douthat asked Trump what he thinks happens to him when he dies.
Trump said he is a religious person, so in theory he goes to heaven. Asked if he actually expects to get there, he told Douthat he hopes so and does not want to go to hell.
So Douthat made it concrete. Imagine all you had to do to enter paradise was feel love and forgiveness for James Comey, Nancy Pelosi, and everyone else you have said you hate. Could you do it?
“The Answer Is No”
Trump did not hesitate for long. He admitted the easy answer would be to say yes. But he called his enemies extremely dishonest, very bad people, and said pretending to forgive them would not be real.
Douthat asked if that was a no. Trump said it was. Douthat pushed again: even before the judgment throne of God? Trump confirmed it. Before the judgment, still no.
Douthat reminded him he has lived one of the most charmed lives in American history. Trump said he knew the easy answer was just to say yes. Then he gave the honest one instead: he probably cannot forgive them, because he hates some of his enemies and always will.
He Said It at Charlie Kirk’s Memorial Too
This was not a slip. Douthat built the question around a moment from September 2025. At Charlie Kirk’s memorial in Arizona, his widow Erika Kirk publicly forgave the man accused of killing her husband.
Minutes later, Trump took the same stage and went the other way. He said Kirk did not hate his opponents, but that he disagreed. “I hate my opponent and I don’t want the best for them,” Trump told the crowd.
His press secretary Karoline Leavitt spent the next day trying to explain it away. More than a year later, with time to think it over and a national TV audience watching, Trump gave the exact same answer.
A Week After a Historic Republican Wipeout
The timing makes it worse for the Republican Party. Trump sat for the interview three days after Republicans lost not just Congress, but statewide offices in Texas, Kansas and South Carolina that Democrats had not won in decades.
Trump blamed the loss on candidates who were not him, on the war, on gas prices, and on public anger at Israel. He insisted things would have gone differently if he had been on the ballot.
Former Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger wrote that this was the moment a politician would normally show a softer side. Trump could not manage it. “For Donald Trump, the grievance always comes first,” Kinzinger wrote.
“You Should’ve Had Stock”
Grievance was not the only thing on display. Douthat raised a Forbes estimate that Trump’s net worth has gone up by $3 billion since he returned to office. Trump’s first response was that everyone’s net worth went up.
Douthat pointed out his did not. Trump shot back that the host should have owned stock.
Douthat then pressed him on World Liberty Financial, the family crypto company Trump co-owns, which is partly owned by investors connected to the government of the United Arab Emirates. Trump claimed he knows nothing about it, said a son watches over his money, and refused to commit to divesting. He argued every president going back to George Washington has had conflicts of interest.
Trump’s Side
Trump framed his answer as honesty. In the interview, he said his enemies put him through years of what he called weaponization, pointing to his indictments and his two impeachments.
He also said he loves the country far more than he can love people like Comey and Pelosi.
The Bottom Line
The Republican president was handed the easiest question of his career and the easiest answer in the world. Say you would try to forgive. Instead, a week after voters threw his party out of power, Donald Trump looked into a camera and promised to hate his enemies forever, heaven or not. That is not a man reflecting on defeat. That is a man telling you exactly who he is.
Sources: CBS News 60 Minutes interview transcript (correspondent Ross Douthat; produced by Andy Court and Graham Messick), AL.com, The Daily Beast (Erkki Forster), New York Post, and Adam Kinzinger’s newsletter.