‘I will keep defending immigrants’: new bishop, who was smuggled into the US as a teen, joins pope’s resistance to Trump

The Right Rev Evelio Menjivar-Ayala vows to ‘keep talking’ as West Virginia bishop, amid tension between Trump and the Vatican

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he new bishop appointed to lead West Virginia Catholics has pledged to continue speaking up for immigrants in the mould of Pope Leo, who appointed him last week amid ongoing tension between Donald Trump and the Vatican.

The Right Rev Evelio Menjivar-Ayala, 55, is not planning to hide his views after being elevated from assistant bishop in Washington DC to lead the diocese that covers West Virginia – the first Latino American bishop from El Salvador, who left Central America as a teenager and arrived in the US smuggled in the trunk of a car.

“I will keep talking about people’s reality, defending immigrants and fighting for fair treatment for them,” Menjivar-Ayala said in an interview with the Guardian at the offices of the archdiocese of Washington, in Hyattsville, Maryland.