Nearly 12,000 people have signed a petition by a nondenominational Christian group protesting possible Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in churches.
Last month, the Department of Homeland Security issued a directive that rescinded Biden administration guidelines for ICE and Customs and Border Protection enforcement actions that thwart law enforcement in or near "sensitive" areas.
"Our churches are sacred spaces where all people should be able to gather, worship, and care for one another without government intrusion or the threat of deportation," Faithful America said in a statement Friday, according to Newsweek. The petition had 11,740 signatures as of 4 p.m. EST on Friday.
Faithful America states on its website that "Christian nationalism is the single biggest threat to both democracy and the church today," echoing a narrative voiced by former President Joe Biden and his administration.
The previous guidelines, enacted on Oct. 27, 2021, cited, among other things, schools, medical care facilities, places of worship, and funerals as "sensitive" areas. It had exceptions in such cases involving a national security threat; imminent risk of death, violence, or physical harm to a person; and pursuit of an individual who poses a public safety threat.
The petition comes amid a federal lawsuit filed by 27 Christian and Jewish groups in Washington, D.C., regarding the new guidelines for ICE. The new guidelines stated that ICE assistant field office directors and assistant special agents in charge are responsible "for making case-by-case determinations regarding whether, where and when to conduct an immigration enforcement action in or near a protected area."
"The Trump administration will not tie the hands of our brave law enforcement, and instead trusts them to use common sense," Benjamine Huffman, who at the time was DHS's acting secretary, said in a Jan. 21 news release.
"The Biden-Harris administration abused the humanitarian parole program to indiscriminately allow 1.5 million migrants to enter our country. This was all stopped on Day 1 of the Trump administration. This action will return the humanitarian parole program to its original purpose of looking at migrants on a case-by-case basis."
Border Patrol Chief Michael Banks said in a video posted on X earlier this month, "Let me be very clear: United States Border Patrol agents do not target schools, school buses or churches."
His post came after the Alice Independent School District in southeastern Texas warned parents that Border Patrol agents might be checking the immigration status of students on school buses traveling for extracurricular activities. The school has since retracted the letter.
John Fabbricatore, a retired ICE field office director in Colorado, told Newsweek that the policy change does not specifically aim to increase operations in schools and churches but remove restrictions on ICE's ability to operate in neighborhoods around sensitive locations.
"They didn't get rid of it so they could go into schools and churches," he said. "They got rid of it so they could actually go into just a regular neighborhood."
Tom Decker, a former ICE New York field office director, told Newsweek, "I think that policy was made up just to appease some groups. Because it wasn't like we were going in churches, going to the hospitals, and going to places after people. That wouldn't be a priority place to go to pick somebody up, to go arrest somebody."
Michael Katz ✉
Michael Katz is a Newsmax reporter with more than 30 years of experience reporting and editing on news, culture, and politics.
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