U.S. President Donald J. Trump is a “Good Samaritan” who is “giving a voice to the silent”, a former Archbishop of Canterbury has said.

Lord Carey, who was the most senior cleric in the Church of England from 1991 to 2002, said Mr. Trump had promised to support the “wounded and helpless left behind by the elite”, adding: “Many will recoil at the identification of Donald Trump as the Good Samaritan but why not, why not?”

Speaking at the Oxford Literary Festival, Lord Carey said: “Is it not true that we have wounded and left-behind communities passed by by the elite, who are too distracted and busy with their own agendas, too busy to look over to see someone in distress?

“And intervention that makes a difference is from a totally unexpected source, the Samaritan, the outsider from a despised sect in Israel.”

The Times reports that he also said Mr. Trump was offering Americans more than just empty words: “Help is not merely kind words. It is the promise of ongoing support.”

The former Archbishop of Canterbury did say, however, that had he been American he would never have voted for Mr. Trump “in a million years but I would have found it quite difficult to vote for Hillary Clinton”.

“What the American election and our Brexit revealed was the same distrust of political leadership, the same desire for a new deal and a deep desire to recover our country,” Lord Carey said.

His comments are in stark contrast to other Anglican leaders.

In January, Archbishop of York John Sentamu criticised the U.S. president’s travel ban, saying it was “extraordinary” any civilised country would do such a thing.

“There is a valid question as to whether Christians, Yazidis and other religious minorities in the Middle East have so far had adequate access to such protection,” he said.

“However a blanket ban on any individual group is bound to undermine the fundamental principles of asylum. In Christ, we are called to welcome the stranger especially when in desperate need.”