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Louis Prevost, brother of the newly elected Pope Leo XIV, Robert Prevost, speaks during an interview outside his home in Port Charlotte, Florida, on May 9, 2025.
Opinion: There’s one in every family. The black and now red sheep. And we know who that is in the pope’s family, writes John Casey
Every family has one. A deranged uncle, a constantly complaining aunt, a cousin who posts conspiracy theories on Facebook, or a brother who blames all of his life’s problems not on himself but on the world that’s out to get him. "Woe is me" is his only tired, eye-rolling refrain.
One of my relatives was hosting a family birthday party recently when her brother-in-law ruined it with smug and verbose remarks about Donald Trump being akin to the second coming. She had warned him on previous visits not to talk about Trump, but those warnings weren’t enough to keep his obsession and obnoxiousness about Trump at bay.
She threw him out of the house, and he hasn’t been back since.
Psychologists call it the "black sheep effect.” It’s a phenomenon in which a member of a group is judged more harshly by their own for violating shared norms. But in truth, the black sheep is more than a moral outlier. They often face those eye rolls and scrutiny that can challenge their so-called personal values and their unwanted opinions.
Which brings us to Louis Prevost, an older brother of Pope Leo XIV. Yes, even the family of the pope has “one.” And not just any one, but a full-blown MAGA motormouth and megaphone. Proving that every family not only has “one” but one who has been brainwashed by Trump. And the “one” who just can’t keep his opinions about Trump to himself.
So let’s call Louis and his ilk the “red sheep effect.”
Louis Prevost, a retiree from the Chicago suburbs now living in Florida, has lately emerged as a “red sheep” with far-right grievances, crowing about Trump and routinely trafficking in vulgar memes about Democratic politicians.
He called Nancy Pelosi a “drunk c---” on Facebook. He mocked Paul Pelosi’s assault. And if I can digress here for a minute. I’ve met with and spoken with Speaker Emerita Pelosi numerous times. Her Catholic faith is sacrosanct to her, so for him to come after her with such venom and vulgarity, a woman who lives and breathes her faith, makes Louis’s insults all the more repulsive..
And as recently as February, he shared a post reading, “Your child isn’t trans, you’re just a sh—ty parent.”
It gets worse. On April 23, just two days after the death of Pope Francis, Louis Prevost launched into a tirade against Barack Obama, whose presidency ended in January 2017. He accused Obama and the Democratic Party of being “one very small step from full-blown communists,” claiming they longed for the destruction of American society and the establishment of a dictatorship, “a racist one on top of it.”
He derided Joe Biden voters as “brain-dead morons.” And when asked if he would tone it down now that his brother had been elected to the papacy, Prevost said that he would probably “tone it down.”
Let’s hope for the Pope’s sake, and for ours, he does tone it down.
Pope Leo XIV, or Robert to his brother Louis, is widely seen as a bridge-builder. He is known for his pastoral care, support for immigrants and the marginalized, and his nuanced approach to divisive theological issues.
He stands in continuity with Pope Francis, emphasizing mercy, humility, and a resistance to nationalism (And he just might harbor the same dislike for Trump that Francis did.) In other words, everything Trumpism isn’t. And that’s why Louis’s words carry such a sting.
Louis seems to be undermining the very values his brother champions. He told Piers Morgan in an interview that his brother essentially doesn’t care about his political posts, but that seems more like wishful thinking than fact.
It’s hard to imagine the now-head of the Roman Catholic Church feeling nothing as his sibling infects social media with his anti-Christian rants.
Sure, It’s tempting to laugh Louis off as a sideshow, like Billy Carter was to his brother, Jimmy. But that’s precisely the problem with Trumpism. It turns familial dysfunction into cultural decay. Even a family that produces a pope isn’t immune to it. And maybe that’s the most disturbing part. It isn’t Louis’s behavior, it’s how familiar it all feels.
I’ve written before about political division cleaving families apart. I spoke in-depth with Caroline Giuliani, Rudy’s daughter, about being estranged from her family because of Trump, and how she is like members of so many other families, including mine, who have seen tears in family bonds..
Even during his first term, when I talked to Mary Trump, Donald’s niece, she gave a detailed account about growing up in a “gay-averse, anti-everything” family that exposed the rot inside the family that her uncle has only exacerbated. However, in the Trump family, it seems the situation is reversed, Mary is the only one who is not a black or red sheep.
Louis Prevost is not an anomaly, Instead, he is a pattern. A symptom. The proof that Trumpism doesn’t just infect institutions, it burrows into Thanksgiving tables, Christmas dinners, birthday parties, and even baptism and confirmation parties.
Of course the Catholic Church is no stranger to scandal, but the Prevost divide isn’t about theological disagreement. It's about the everyday tragedy of watching loved ones disappear into a political cult. Millions of Americans know what it’s like to sit across from someone they used to love, only to realize they now live on different planets, tuned to different frequencies, loyal to different gods.
It’s not even clear if Louis Prevost sees the irony of aligning himself with a man who once tear-gassed peaceful protesters outside a church. A man who's been married three times, insulted the pope, and once held up a Bible upside down, and then of course sold a branded Trump Bible.
And maybe that’s what makes this story so sad. Pope Leo XIV cannot excommunicate his brother, and Louis Prevost, despite his claims of respect, may only temporarily mute his opinions. Chances are, like my aunt’s brother-in-law, he won’t be able to control himself, bite his tongue for long, because Trump is like a stomach virus. You can only hold it down so long before you have to regurgitate.
So no, this isn’t just a weird quirk, like a punch line to a pope jock. It’s a cautionary tale. One that reminds us that none of us are safe from the madness, that even divine callings can’t always stop a MAGA meme.
There’s one in every family. The black and red sheep. And now we know who that is in the pope’s family.
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