First Amendment lawsuit targets immigration detentions in places of worship

Jay Weaver and Antonio Maria Delgado, Miami Herald on Apr 29, 2025

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A group of churches from California to Florida have sued the Trump administration over its historic policy change pushing for the arrest of undocumented immigrants at places of worship, saying it violates their First Amendment rights protecting them from enforcement activity.

The churches filed suit Monday in federal court in Oregon, challenging the Department of Homeland Security’s policy that overturned decades of both Democratic and Republican policies that hewed to the Constitution’s guaranteeing of the free exercise of religion and right to assembly.

“The Plaintiff organizations’ purposes and missions are thwarted by the Trump administration’s abrupt and unexplained change in the rules, which have imbued previously safe spaces with fear,” the lawsuit says. “They face mounting difficulties in carrying out their missions to welcome, serve, educate, and heal.”

The suit was triggered by the Department of Homeland Security’s Jan. 20, 2021, memo revoking a Biden administration policy on “sensitive locations” that reflected longstanding government guidelines to avoid arrests of undocumented immigrants in places of worship, schools and health clinics. The day after the memo was signed by the agency’s acting secretary, DHS issued a statement saying the tightening of immigration law enforcement “empowers” federal agents “to protect Americans” from the “invasion” of the southern border by “criminal aliens ... who have illegally come into our country.”

“Criminals will no longer be able to hide in America’s schools and churches to avoid arrest,” the DHS statement said. “The Trump Administration will not tie the hands of our brave law enforcement, and instead trusts them to use common sense.”

The Department of Homeland Security could not be immediately reached for comment Tuesday. The agency, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and ICE officials are among the named defendants in the suit.

The lawsuit, filed in the federal district court in Eugene, was brought by immigration legal advocates, including the Justice Action Center in Los Angeles, on behalf of a group of churches in Oregon, California and Florida. They are: Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste; Augustana Lutheran Church; Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish; San Francisco Interfaith Council, and Westminster Presbyterian Church, in Gainesville.

In the suit, the churches said "their efforts to cultivate sacred spaces where their communities may gather freely have been turned upside down because they must decide if, by providing such spaces, they are offering their friends and neighbors not safety, but an unacceptable risk of unchecked and unfair immigration enforcement that could tear their families apart.”

The Oregon federal case follows a similar suit filed in March by two groups of churches in Georgia that sued the government over the revocation of a policy that previously limited immigration enforcement at places of worship.

On the day Donald Trump was sworn in as president, DHS rescinded the “sensitive locations” policy, which had deterred agents from entering churches without exceptional cause. Although judicial warrants are still required, religious leaders say fear of enforcement has caused congregants, especially immigrants, to avoid services, disrupting community programs and spiritual life.

Churches in Georgia claim they have seen attendance drop and volunteers withdraw due to fear and argue that the policy change violates their First Amendment rights and impedes their mission to serve others.

In an incident reported in late January, migrant Wilson Rogelio Velasquez Cruz was arrested by ICE agents outside the church he was attending in Tucker, Georgia, with his wife and three children.

His wife later told a local TV station that Velasquez Cruz had received a call during service, which he didn’t answer, and that triggered his ankle monitor to go off. Not wanting to disrupt the church function, Velasquez Cruz stepped outside to check on the monitor only to find immigration agents waiting for him, who promptly detained him.

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