“Can we doubt that only a Divine Providence placed this land, this island of freedom, here as a refuge for all those people in the world who yearn to breathe freely?”
– Ronald W. Reagan
As a presidential candidate, Donald Trump made illegal immigration a signature issue of his campaign. Among his claims was that “Mexico was sending violent criminals, including rapists, to the United States.” Trump also called for the deportation of “more than eleven million undocumented immigrants living in the United States” and threatened to “triple the number of Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] agents.” He promised to “restrict legal immigration” and put an end to birthright citizenship, which extends automatic citizenship to children born in the United States. Trump pledged not only to build a wall across the entire southern United States border, but also to have Mexico pay for it.
After inauguration, President Trump wasted no time implementing many of his campaign promises with a barrage of harsh anti-immigrant policies—mostly by executive order. On one day alone, President Trump signed two such orders. The first, “Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States,” announced massive immigration enforcement priorities destined to devastate immigrant communities. The second, “Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements,” included costly plans to further militarize the United States-Mexico border, build the wall he promised during his campaign, and increase immigration enforcement priorities.0 Perhaps the most well-known (and unpopular) of his executive orders was the one he signed two days later, entitled “Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States,” which promised to “keep radical Islamic terrorists outside the United States.” This order left thousands of refugees facing life-threatening danger without protection by ceasing all refugee admissions for four months and the admission of Syrian refugees indefinitely. It also imposed a ninety- day ban on entry for all people with immigrant and nonimmigrant visas from seven predominantly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syrian, and Yemen. After being blocked by various courts, President Trump signed a superseding order on March 6, 2017.
In response to the President’s hard line stance on immigration, many American churches and other places of worship have declared themselves sanctuaries, or safe havens, for undocumented and other vulnerable immigrants. The number of sanctuary sites has more than doubled since Donald Trump took office, bringing the total to more than 800 according to the Church World Service. Part II of this article examines the origins of sanctuary as both a legal and moral obligation for churches and other places of worship. Part III looks at the history of the Sanctuary Movement in the United States in the 1980s, and the ways that sanctuary has shaped the current national immigration debate. Part IV explores how courts have interpreted liability under the anti-harboring provisions of section 1324 of the Immigration and Nationality Act. And finally, Part V looks at what considerations congregations in today’s America will need to balance should they decide to offer sanctuary to America’s vulnerable immigrant population.