President Donald Trump defended Chief of Staff John Kelly during an interview airing Sunday, calling him an "elegant man" in the wake of the controversy this week over Trump's phone call to a military widow.

Kelly came to Trump's defense after Democratic Rep. Frederica Wilson (Fla.) said Trump acted insensitively in his phone call to Myeshia Johnson, the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson.

"He is a very elegant man, he is a tough, strong, four-star Marine," Trump said in interview with Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo. "If you're a four-star Marine, you've got something special to start off with."

Kelly said he was "stunned" by Wilson's conduct in revealing the details of a "sacred" phone call.

"He was so offended because he was in the room when I made the call. He was so offended that somebody would be listening to that call," Trump said. "He actually couldn't believe it, actually he said to me, ‘sir, this is not acceptable.'"

Trump opened up about making calls to those with fallen loved ones, saying these are the "toughest calls."

"These are tougher than dealing with the heads of countries, believe me. These are very, very hard calls, sad, you know, the grieving is so incredible," Trump said.

Trump continued his praise of Kelly.

"He doesn’t need this job, in fact, he didn't really want this job … he was doing this incredible job on the border and elsewhere. You know, he ran Homeland like nobody's ever run it," Trump said of Kelly, who formerly served as Secretary of Homeland Security.

Trump called Wilson's comments this week "sickening." Wilson blasted the White House as liars and also laughed that she was now a "rock star" because of the feud.

"[Kelly's] not doing it for what he wants, he does it for the country," Trump said. "So when she made that statement, I thought it was sickening."