More than two dozen churches, temples and other religious organizations are challenging President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration policy — and specifically, his decision to allow immigration enforcement agents to make arrests at places of worship.
Twenty-seven organizations representing Jewish and Christian faiths say their congregations have experienced a decrease in worship attendance due to fear of Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity in the weeks since Trump reversed longstanding guidelines preventing ICE from making detainments in “sensitive locations,” according to a lawsuit obtained by HuffPost.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, alleges the Department of Homeland Security’s authorization to make detainments at places of worship violates the First Amendment, as well as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which curtails the federal government’s ability to restrict religious practices.
“Every human being, regardless of birthplace, is a child of God worthy of dignity, care, and love,” the lawsuit reads. “Welcoming the stranger, or immigrant, is thus a central precept of their faith practices.”
In a press release shared with HuffPost, Kelsi Corkran, who is representing the various religious organizations, says his clients united to challenge Trump’s policy because their teachings “offer irrefutable unanimity on their religious obligation to embrace and serve the refugees, asylum seekers, and immigrants in their midst without regard to documentation or legal status.”
“As Jewish leaders, we are mindful of our history as an immigrant people,” Central Conference of American Rabbis executive Hara Person said in a statement about the lawsuit.
“Jews in the United States came as immigrants and so we have always supported and welcomed immigrants,” Person wrote. “The most often repeated command in the Torah is to care for the stranger because we were strangers in the land of Egypt — in this way our scripture and history compels us to work with and help immigrants and refugees.”
“Welcoming the stranger is not a political act — it’s a sacred obligation,” said the Episcopal Church’s Julia Ayala Harris in a statement. “When immigrants walk through our church doors, they’re not entering as outsiders; they are stepping into the heart of our faith, where their dignity and stories are embraced as reflections of God’s love.”
The lawsuit also alleges fears surrounding immigration enforcement have led to a decline of attendance in many of the social services that these religious institutions offer undocumented congregants, including food pantries and clothing giveaways, English classes, legal assistance and job training.
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The faith leaders are asking the court to issue a permanent injunction prohibiting immigration enforcement activities at houses of worship or during religious ceremonies, unless agents have a judicial warrant or are operating under “exigent circumstances.”
DHS Assistant Secretary of Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin addressed the lawsuit in an email to HuffPost, saying she expects immigration enforcement at sensitive locations “to be extremely rare.” She added that officers need a secondary supervisor approval before any action can be taken in locations such as churches and schools.
“We are protecting our schools, places of worship, and Americans who attend,” McLaughlin wrote, “by preventing criminal aliens and gang members from exploiting these locations and taking safe haven there because these criminals knew law enforcement couldn’t go inside under the previous Administration.”