President Donald Trump announced he and first lady Melania Trump would travel to Rome for Pope Francis‘ funeral.
‘Melania and I will be going to the funeral of Pope Francis, in Rome. We look forward to being there!,’ he wrote on social media.
The Vatican said Francis, the first pope from Latin America, died after a stroke and requested a simple tomb in Rome.
His tomb may be simple but his funeral will be a state occasion with multiple world leaders likely to attend.
President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump met with Pope Francis at the Vatican in May 2017
The Vatican has not announced a funeral date or formal plans but a pontiff’s funeral and interment must take place four to six days after his death. The service traditionally takes place in St. Peter’s Square.
The funeral would be Trump’s first international trip of his second term.
He paid tribute to Pope Francis at the White House Easter Egg Roll on Monday, saying he was putting the flags at half-staff to honor the pontiff.
‘He was a good man, he worked hard and loved the world,’ Trump said.
Trump’s Vice President J.D. Vance was one of the last people to have an official meeting with Francis.
The two men met Easter Sunday, one of the pope’s final engagements before his death.
Francis asked to be buried in a ‘niche of the side nave between the Cappella Paolina (Chapel of the Salus Populi Romani) and the Cappella Sforza of the aforementioned Papal Basilica.’
‘The tomb must be in the earth; simple, without particular decoration and with the only inscription: Franciscus,’ his request read.
Trump met the Pope at the Vatican in his first term in May 2017.
Francis was pontiff during Barack Obama’s, Joe Biden’s and Trump’s presidencies.
It’s unclear if the two former presidents will attend.
When then-President George W. Bush attended Pope John Paul II’s funeral in April 2005 he brought his father, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton on Air Force One with him.
