{"id":900049,"date":"2026-10-30T15:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T15:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/900049\/"},"modified":"2026-10-30T15:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T15:44:09","slug":"pope-leo-requested-absentee-ballot-in-illinois-to-vote-in-midterms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/900049\/","title":{"rendered":"Pope Leo requested absentee ballot in Illinois to vote in midterms"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pope Leo XIV, a registered voter in Illinois<\/a>, has voted in next week\u2019s midterm elections<\/a> after he requested a mail ballot at his residence in Vatican City.<\/p>\n

\u201cPope Leo XIV has exercised his right to vote as a United States citizen, whenever he was eligible to do so,\u201d the Vatican press office said Friday in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Holy Father expresses his belief in the right and the duty of citizens to participate in democratic processes,\u201d it added.<\/p>\n

Leo, whose birth name is Robert Francis Prevost, requested the ballot Oct. 3, the Will County Clerk\u2019s Office chief of staff, Kim Fladhammer, confirmed to NBC News on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The Chicago Sun-Times<\/a> first reported the ballot request.<\/p>\n

The clerk\u2019s office told NBC News it has not yet received a completed ballot from the pope, who had lung cancer surgery<\/a> this month. The ballot\u2019s journey will take it from Vatican City to Joliet, Illinois.<\/p>\n

And by virtue of becoming the first American pope in May 2025, Leo will be the first pope to vote in a U.S. election.<\/p>\n

Since he became pope, Leo has been an outspoken critic of certain Trump policies, including the U.S. war against Iran and the administration\u2019s treatment of immigrants.<\/p>\n

Leo and President Donald Trump got into a back-and-forth<\/a> in April after Leo called for peace in the war that began with U.S.-Israeli strikes on Feb. 28. Trump responded on social media<\/a> by calling the pope \u201cWEAK on crime\u201d and \u201cterrible for Foreign Policy\u201d while taking credit for his papacy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not a big fan of Pope Leo,\u201d Trump said at the time.<\/p>\n

Leo responded to the remarks, telling NBC News that he had \u201cno fear of the Trump administration\u201d and vowing to keep advocating for peace.<\/p>\n

Vice President JD Vance, who is Catholic, has also hurled criticism in Leo\u2019s direction. Vance said he should \u201cbe careful\u201d when he talks about theology<\/a>, scolding him for his criticisms of U.S. foreign policy.<\/p>\n

Public records show that Leo has voted in previous elections, casting ballots in the 2012, 2014, 2018 and 2024 general elections. He also voted in Republican primaries in 2012, 2014 and 2016. Voters in Illinois do not register by party, and they can select which party\u2019s primary they want to vote in each election cycle.<\/p>\n

Leo\u2019s ballot this year includes a series of solidly blue races. His congressman is Rep. Jonathan Jackson<\/a>, D-Ill., the son of the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the brother of former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., who is seeking re-election.<\/p>\n

Senate Democratic nominee Juliana Stratton<\/a>, the state\u2019s lieutenant governor, is seeking to succeed retiring Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin. <\/p>\n

Gov. JB Pritzker, meanwhile, is running for re-election, aspiring to become the first Democrat in the state elected to a third term as governor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pope Leo XIV, a registered voter in Illinois, has voted in next week\u2019s midterm elections after he requested…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":900050,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-900049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=900049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/900050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=900049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=900049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=900049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}