Judge Chuang agreed that the Trump administration’s directive has “chilled” participation and worship among their congregations, while the Department of Homeland Security has “provided no facts demonstrating how its interests, in increased immigration enforcement or otherwise, would be materially and adversely impacted” by temporarily blocking its policy as a legal challenge plays out.
“For decades, the government has recognized that everyone — no matter their immigration status — should be able to attend houses of worship without fear of a warrantless government raid,” according to a statement from Skye Perryman, CEO of Democracy Forward, which represented plaintiffs in the lawsuit.
For more than 300 years, Quaker groups “have been committed to the fundamental right of anyone and everyone to worship freely,” according to a statement from Sarah Gillooly, general secretary of Baltimore Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends.
ICE is temporarily blocked from policing mostly Quaker groups after threats of immigration enforcement ‘chilled’ worship among congregations.
Trump and his allies argued arrests would target immigrants who committed high-level crimes, but the administration later said it was treating all immigrants in the U.S. without legal permission as “criminals.”.
