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In this episode of Straight White American Jesus, we discuss the recent escalation in ICE raids across the country, including arrests at sensitive locations like churches, schools, and hospitals, following the Trump administration’s revocation of the sensitive locations policy. We explore the history and significance of the sanctuary movement, in which churches provided refuge to undocumented immigrants starting in the 1980s, and how these protections are now at risk. To deepen the discussion, we feature the final episode of Sanctuary: On the Border Between Church and State, a seven-part podcast series by Dr. Sergio Gonzalez (Marquette University) and Dr. Lloyd Barba (Amherst College). The series provides a comprehensive history of the sanctuary movement and its implications for today. For those interested in the intersection of immigration, religion, and U.S. policy, this episode is a must-listen.
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Welcome to Straight White American Jesus on this Monday.
A couple of things before we get started today.
If you haven't heard, we are launching One Nation, Indivisible, with Andrew L. Seidel.
In February, many of you know Andrew's work, constitutional lawyer, author of The Founding Myth and American Crusade.
Someone who's just an amazing voice when it comes to matters regarding separation of church and state, and so many other things related to the fight against Christian nationalism in this country.
That's coming soon.
Check it out.
If you are a member of Swatch Premium, you'll get all the bonus content to Andrew's podcast as well.
So, if you've been on the fence about signing up, today's the day.
Make sure to do it.
It's on sale for 50 bucks a year.
Check it out in...
The show notes.
Coming up in the next few weeks, I have a bunch of great interviews about constitutional sheriffs and the Trump presidency.
Going to be talking to Katherine Stewart about her new book on money, God, and democracy, the ways that Christian nationalists have built networks across the country, and a few others.
So look forward to those discussions here in the next couple of weeks.
If you've been listening for the last few weeks, I've been talking about a theme, Repealing the 20th Century.
It's something I see throughout Trump's agenda, something I've seen in the run-up to his presidency, and in the first week he's been in office.
This week we're going to make a slight detour to the topic of immigration and sanctuary.
Many of you know already that ICE is making increased arrests and is...
Doing raids across the country from North Texas to where I live in the Bay Area in California to Georgia.
There's reports of ICE showing up at a church in Atlanta this weekend.
They asked for an individual.
The pastor said that they would not grant them access.
And ICE subsequently waited at the door for the person to leave and then arrested them.
This is part...
of something new when it comes to immigration and ICE in this country.
A couple of days ago, the Trump administration revoked the sensitive locations policy.
This was a policy that stopped ICE from going into places like churches and hospitals and schools.
And this policy, although it's been a kind of Biden-era memo, is something that has precedent going back a long time.
For a long time, churches especially have been sanctuaries where immigration officials have not been able to enter and would not dare enter.
There's been a sense that going into a church would cross a boundary, that it would step over a line that shouldn't be crossed in the United States.
Well, that seems to be changing.
I'm hearing in my own city of ICE officers questioning students on school buses.
We're hearing about them showing up at hospitals, and again just this weekend, reports of them showing up at a church and waiting for someone outside.
Because of all this, I wanted to provide something this week that I think a lot of you might have missed, and something that I think can be immensely helpful in this moment.
A couple of months ago, Access Moody Media produced a series called Sanctuary, on the border between church and state.
It was created by two historians of immigration and religion in the United States, Dr. Sergio Gonzalez of Marquette and Dr. Lloyd Barba of Amherst College.
Sanctuary, the podcast series, provides a comprehensive history of the sanctuary movement, the movement in which refugees from Central America, starting in the 1980s, were able to find sanctuary and safety and security in churches, And thus, away from immigration officers.
These were churches that, despite the danger and despite the insecurity of doing so, were willing to house immigrants in their buildings such that they were not able to be deported.
As a movement, sanctuary spans the 80s all the way to Trump's first term and now into the present day.
In the episode you're going to hear today, Dr. Barba and Dr. Gonzalez explain how things changed during Trump's first term, what might be upon us as we head into his second term, and what is at stake if places like churches are no longer able to be sanctuaries for the undocumented.
The entire series is available for free.
If you look in the show notes, you will find the link to subscribe to Sanctuary on the Border Between Church and State.
It's a seven-part series.
That is, I think, the most comprehensive and accessible resource on the sanctuary movement we have.
If you're a teacher or somebody who's a part of adult education or just want to learn about this movement, it's a great resource.
So, without further ado, here is Episode 7 of Sanctuary on the Border Between Church and State.
Axis Mundi Axis Mundi Well, Lloyd, we've arrived at our last episode.
what more fitting place to start than my hometown of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Now, in the summer of 2024, Republican Party delegates from every state in possession of the country gathered in Milwaukee.
Their charge?
To make official what had been presumed for the previous four years, that Donald J. Trump would be the GOP candidate for president of the United States.
In many ways, the Republican National Convention was like all political conventions that had preceded it.
The room was decked out in red, white, and blue.
There were plenty of speeches.
Some more invigorating than others, from elected officials, celebrities, and those so-called everyday Americans who somehow found their way onto the stage.
And, of course, the promises of the out-of-office party to make the country great again.
This convention, however, was certainly different.
Just days before, Donald Trump had survived an assassination attempt, one that had left the president bloodied but resilient to continue on.
Now, over those four days, speaker after speaker, including the son of Billy Graham, Reverend Franklin Graham, thanked the Lord for Trump's survival.
President Trump had a near-death experience.
No question.
But God spared his life.
It was a sign, speakers noted breathlessly, that Trump was protected by the Almighty.
And that meant that the Lord had blessed Trump's mission.
When President Trump rose from that platform, he rose with his fist raised in strength, showing America his unshakable resolve to fight for them in this nation.
Now, in the days leading up to the RNC, pundits had opined that the assassination attempt might leave Trump a changed man.
Well, Lloyd, that's what a near-death experience can do, of course.
Well, presumably.
So, leading in the polls against his presumptive opponent, incumbent Democratic President Joe Biden, perhaps Trump and the party more generally would work to unite the nation, you know, instead of leaning so heavily into the political rhetoric that often marks these types of events.
Yeah, and while Trump promised...
I am running to be president.
For all of America, not half of America, because there is no victory in winning for half of America.
Yeah, and see, instead of unity, the entire convention was, of course, a reminder of how the Republican Party had now fully embraced Trump's MAGA movement.
And that included very clearly defining who is a real American and who belongs in this country.
But what I found out was I was in a room full of real Americans, brother.
And at the end of the day, with our leader up there, my hero, that gladiator, we're going to bring America back together.
One real American at a time, brother.
Trump used his nomination speech to extend the platform that made him the political figure that he is today.
At this point, listeners, of course, probably already know where we're headed.
We also have an illegal immigration crisis, and it's taking place right now as we sit here in this beautiful arena.
It's a massive invasion at our southern border that has spread misery, crime, poverty, disease, and destruction to communities.
All across our land.
Nobody's ever seen anything like it.
Things had gotten, Trump noted, even worse since he'd left office.
The greatest invasion in history is taking place right here in our country.
They are coming in from every corner of the earth, not just from South America, but from Africa, Asia.
The Middle East, they're coming from everywhere.
They're coming at levels that we've never seen before.
It is an invasion indeed.
And this administration does absolutely nothing to stop them.
And there was really only one way to solve this invasion.
Or at least, that's what Trump offered the crowd in Milwaukee.
But all the time, that's why to keep our families safe, the Republican platform promises to launch the largest deportation operation in the history of our country.
Trump also recounted meeting the families of Jocelyn Nungary, Rachel Morin, and Lakin Riley, Americans who had been killed by migrants in the country without legal documentation.
The names of these women, repeated so many times on Fox News and Newsmax over the last few years, have become shorthand for the dangers posed by sanctuary cities.
Clearly, immigration was front and center in Milwaukee at the RNC. The 2024 Republican platform The second night of the RNC
drove all these points home, titled Making America Safe Again.
The speakers heavily focused on immigration and how Biden's border policies have allowed illegal drugs and migrants to stream into the country.
One theme was everyday Americans whose lives had been ruined by open borders.
That night featured American mom Ann Fundner from California, whose teenage son died from a fentanyl overdose.
She was followed by the Moran family from Maryland.
Rachel Morin, a mother of five, was killed by an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador in 2023. Her brother recounted to the crowd what had led to her death.
Open borders are often portrayed as compassionate and virtuous.
But there is nothing compassionate about allowing violent criminals My sister's death was preventable.
The monster arrested for killing Rachel entered the US unlawfully after killing a woman in El Salvador.
And his designated border czar, Kamala Harris, opened our borders to him and others like him, empowering them to victimize the innocent.
Now, as you heard, Warren placed his sister's death squarely at the feet of President Biden and his supposed open borders policy.
And he wasn't the last person to warn about the dangers those open borders pose to the nation.
Steve Scalise, the majority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives, picked up the thread, drawing upon the warning, without any sort of evidence, that Biden was laying out the welcome mat to undocumented immigrants and showing them right to the voting booth.
On voting!
Our most sacred right as citizens, voting.
Biden and Harris want illegals to vote now that they've opened up the border.
Republicans will repass the SAVE Act to block illegal aliens from voting in our elections.
And Speaker of the House Mike Johnson rang a similar bell.
And we cannot allow the many millions of illegal aliens they've allowed to cross our borders to harm our citizens, drain our resources, or disrupt our elections.
We will not allow it.
And then...
It was time for Senator Ted Cruz, the once presidential hopeful and former Trump antagonist.
We are facing an invasion on our southern border.
Not figuratively, a literal invasion.
11.5 million people have crossed our border illegally under Joe Biden.
And then Cruz ramped up the rhetoric.
Referencing the alleged violence committed by migrants released by Democratic district attorneys and the sex slavery they allowed to run rampant across the border.
And he went on, referencing Kate Steinle.
Now, listeners might remember from our past episode that Steinle was the original case pushed by Republicans in the anti-sanctuary city crusade.
Cruz then listed more people killed by immigrants over the last few years.
And we'll note he went on to list women specifically killed by these people.
They're our daughters, our sisters, our friends.
The families don't care about the empty numbers.
They care about the empty chairs at the dinner table.
About the voices they'll never hear again.
The only way to stop this lawlessness?
Well, MAGA certainly had the answer to, quote, restore our future.
Another former presidential hopeful?
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis piled on.
They support open borders, allowing millions and millions of illegal aliens to pour into our country and to burden our communities.
But just don't send any to Martha's Vineyard, then they get really upset.
DeSantis was referring to his political stunts leveraged against so-called sanctuary cities.
We'll hear more about that later in this episode.
But it was New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik who clearly put sanctuary cities in the crosshairs of the RNC scope.
To Biden's violent crime crisis, fueled by Democrats' pro-criminal sanctuary cities and defund the police policies like we have seen in my home state of New York.
And on it went.
The third night of the RNC barreled down even harder on the border.
As primetime on television arrived, staff hurriedly handed out a new visual aid for attendees.
Those watching from home saw hundreds of delegates waving mass deportation now signs as speakers took the stage.
Former ICE director and presumptive future official in the Trump administration, Thomas Homan, warned undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. that Trump was prepared to do what Biden had it.
As a guy who spent 34 years deporting illegal aliens, I got a message.
to the millions of illegal aliens that Joe Biden's released in our country in violation of federal law, you better start packing now.
You're damn right.
Because you're going home.
Then came Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who...
Like Florida's Ron DeSantis, has made a spectacle of relocating migrants to so-called sanctuary cities.
He channeled the sentiments of those holding up the mass deportation now signs.
He will arrest the criminal illegal immigrants and put them behind bars.
Or send them back.
Everyone seemed to be going back to the same messaging that birthed the MAGA movement.
*Cheering* Make America safe again?
Well, to hear the Republican Party as they announced their platform in Milwaukee this summer, there's really only one way to do that.
seal the border, end sanctuary cities, and start the mass deportation of millions of undocumented residents that called the United States home.
So what does that mean for today's sanctuary movement?
This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.
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Welcome to Sanctuary, a limited podcast series about immigration, faith, and the borders between church a limited podcast series about immigration, faith, and the borders between church Sanctuary was created by me, Dr. Setio Gonzalez.
And me, Dr. Lloyd Barba.
In conjunction with the Institute for Religion, Media, and Civic Engagement and Access Multimedia.
Sanctuary was produced by Dr. Bradley Onishi and engineered by Scott Okamoto.
Carrie Onishi provided production assistance.
Sanctuary was made possible through generous funding from the Henry Luce Foundation and with support from the Religion Department at Amherst College.
Additional support was provided by the American Academy of Religion.
And before we get started, we just want to warn listeners that this series contains infrequent depictions of violence and sexual assault that may not be suitable for all listeners.
All right, Sergio, what if I told you that sanctuary has been preventing these, quote, mass deportations from happening for quite some time now?
Yeah, well, I suppose it would help us make a whole lot more sense as to why Trump and his first attorney general, Jeff Sessions, were so determined to dismantle sanctuary cities.
That's right.
And it's not just the actual physical sheltering that sanctuary congregations engage in or the non-cooperation policies that sanctuary municipalities pass to stop these deportations.
Remember, as we've discussed multiple times in our time together, sanctuary is also about raising the broader political consciousness of Americans.
The more people know about how destructive deportation policies are, the more likely they are to vote against those policies or even help mobilize them.
Right, so it's not a stretch to say, then, that the existence of sanctuary congregations, cities, states, and various jurisdictions has really thrown a wrench in this mass deportation plan.
Let's just take the example of those cities so maligned by the attendees at the RNC this summer.
While there is no single one-size-fits-all definition of municipal sanctuary, At the level of cities and secular jurisdictions, one common feature is non-cooperation agreements.
Exactly.
So in a nutshell, immigration law is a work of the federal government and not your local, everyday city police officer's job.
So the non-cooperation in this is that sanctuary cities, counties, and states discourage or sometimes prohibit the designated local authority from enforcing federal immigration law.
And let's also reiterate, study after study on sanctuary cities has shown that there's no positive correlation between sanctuary city status and violent crime.
And that's obviously pretty contrary to what the lineup of speakers at the RNC would have you believe.
Those studies have shown, in fact, that cities that adopt sanctuary policies are, in fact, safer.
Those non-cooperation agreements between local police and federal immigration officers allow undocumented residents to have a sense of trust with police and sheriffs.
And that also means that if they don't have to worry about their immigration status being reported, they won't fear reporting other crimes to authorities.
So, in other words, sanctuary cities are actually making the country safer?
That's exactly it.
And as long as law enforcement in cities and states refuse to cooperate with, let's say, an even more enhanced federal immigration force, Trump and other demonizers of immigrants can't enact their mass deportations.
So I guess it's little wonder.
That he's made attacking those sanctuary sites central to his immigration crusade.
Remember, he came right out of the gate bemoaning those, quote, lawless cities.
In his first week in office.
Enhancing public safety in the interior of the United States.
Public safety in the interior of the United States.
What can be wrong with it?
And even though a federal judge blocked Trump's executive order in November 2017, the battle to withhold funding from sanctuary cities would continue throughout his first term in office.
Just a few months later, the Trump administration sued the state of California over their so-called sanctuary policies.
And unsurprisingly, the Supreme Court dismissed that lawsuit out of hand.
Yeah, but as we know, when it comes to immigration, Trump is nothing if not persistent.
His next move in April 2019?
Threatening to send undocumented immigrants en masse to those cities that had declared themselves sanctuaries.
But if they don't agree, we might as well do what they always say they want.
We'll bring the illegal, really call them the illegals, I call them the illegals.
They came across the border illegally.
We'll bring them to sanctuary city areas and let that particular area take care of it, whether it's a state or whatever it might be.
California certainly is always saying, oh, we want more people.
And they want more people in their sanctuary cities.
Well, we'll give them more people.
We can give them a lot.
We can give them an unlimited supply.
And let's see if they're so happy.
They say we have open arms.
They're always saying they have open arms.
Let's see if they have open arms.
As you might imagine, California's elected officials responded immediately.
California Governor Gavin Newsom, who had become one of Trump's most vocal antagonists, savaged Trump's proposal.
It's illegal.
It's immoral.
It's unethical.
It's sophomoric.
It's petulant.
And it's par for the course.
Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf joined Newsom, bemoaning Trump's rhetoric and potential policy.
The idea that this administration could use human beings, families, children to exact political vengeance on enemies.
The White House quickly put out a statement that there was no actual plan to create a federal structure to move migrants from the border to so-called sanctuary cities.
But the idea had legs, especially as sanctuary cities continued to be a red meat issue for the Republican Party base.
So in October 2019, at the International Association of the Chiefs of Police, Trump ratcheted up his rhetoric.
He went after sanctuary cities full blast.
Not surprisingly, grossly misrepresenting what sanctuary city policies actually do.
The most dangerous and shameful attacks on the rule of law comes from and in the form of sanctuary cities.
Sanctuary cities order jails and prisons to release criminal aliens.
People that have committed the worst crimes directly back onto city streets.
Instead of safely turning them over to federal immigration authorities and ICE so they can be incarcerated or tried, or what I like to do best is get them the hell out of our country and bring them home.
Let them take care of them.
And it wasn't just Trump who was demanding anti-sanctuary city policies.
This became one of the leading issues In Republican political campaigns, including the 2018 midterm elections.
Listen to just one example.
This one from Florida.
A young woman gunned down by an illegal immigrant who should have been deported, but was protected by a sanctuary city.
I'm Richard Corcoran.
When I heard Kate Steinle's story, I thought about my own daughter, Kate, and how this could have happened to any family anywhere.
Incredibly, some Tallahassee politicians want to make Florida a sanctuary state.
On my watch, Florida will never be a sanctuary state.
Now, most of the time, these politicians were just making up crime stats to justify their stances.
But if they needed any sort of data to buttress their claims, they could always turn to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR. Listeners, remember FAIR? They were one of the central antagonists of the 1980s sanctuary movement.
You might recall in Episode 4 when we heard from FAIR representatives debating sanctuary leaders on national television on Donahue and the Today Show.
Jim Corbett, whom you saw on the tape, is with us this morning, as is Roger Conner, the Executive Director of FAIR, which stands for the Federation for American Immigration Reform.
Mr. Conner, you are opposed to sanctuary for these refugees.
Well, in the 21st century, FAIR maintained their status as one of the biggest detractors of all things sanctuary.
Now, they've turned their sights on sanctuary cities.
In the 2018 midterms, they ran ads against vulnerable Democratic senators running for re-election.
Florida Senator Bill Nelson says he supports continued funding for dangerous sanctuary cities.
West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin says he supports continued funding for dangerous sanctuary cities.
Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown says he supports continued funding for dangerous sanctuary cities.
Wisconsin Senator Tammy Baldwin says she supports continued funding for dangerous sanctuary cities.
According to Fair, these Democrats stood in the way of Trump's plan to rid the nation of some of the most dangerous places in the United States.
All right.
Fair.
A slew of Republican politicians.
Who else was riding the anti-sanctuary city train?
Well, let's turn to one of the real innovators of this strategy, we could say.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
Good idea.
Now, even though Trump savagely thumped him in the primary for the Republican Party 2024 presidential nomination, DeSantis has been a willing MAGA warrior.
Most importantly, their anti-immigration vision is virtually the same.
At the state level in Florida, DeSantis implemented the laws and policies that Trump fancied he would put in place for the country as president.
On the campaign trail in 2023, DeSantis vowed that he would follow up on what Trump couldn't deliver.
And what one key item might that be?
Well, you guessed it.
Sanctuary cities.
Two good questions.
So the first is, what am I going to do about sanctuary cities?
Just like I did in Florida, we're going to ban sanctuary cities.
And we're gonna hold any sanctuary city accountable.
From there, he went on to describe a phenomenon that we will unpack a bit more now in this episode.
You know, it's interesting.
I mean, these sanctuary cities, it's all virtue signaling.
You know, New York City said sanctuary city.
Now they're not so sure about that, right?
Martha's Vineyard said they were a sanctuary city.
They couldn't even handle 50 illegal aliens.
I mean, give me a break.
So we are going to hold them accountable on that, definitely, across the board.
Lloyd, hold on, hold on.
Martha's Vineyard, that's that small island off the coast of your state, right?
That's right.
Many listeners might remember this rather recent history.
In September 2022, DeSantis touted that he had facilitated the transport of nearly 50 Venezuelan migrants by plane to Martha's Vineyard.
Yeah, and for those of you who don't know, Martha's Vineyard is an island just south of Cape Cod.
Visitors usually arrive by ferry, and it's long been filled with well-to-do families.
For some, probably like DeSantis, you hear Martha's Vineyard, and your mind might think, ah, coastal elites.
But in reality, there's actually a rather large working-class immigrant Brazilian population there, too.
Oh, for sure.
DeSantis orchestrated this stunt from start to finish.
Let's remember.
Florida is not a border state, though there is a sizable Latino immigrant population there.
The Venezuelan migrants were first lured off the streets of San Antonio, Texas, and, under false pretenses, told, once they arrived in Boston, they could more quickly get to work because it's a sanctuary city.
In response to the flurry of media attention, DeSantis held a press conference on September 15th.
But yes, if you have folks that are inclined to think Florida is a good place, our message to them is we are not a sanctuary state, and it's better to be able to go to a sanctuary jurisdiction.
And yes, we will help facilitate that transport for you to be able to go to greener pastures.
DeSantis would continue to relish in the media attention he received over this.
And he said all he was really doing was sharing some of the pain border cities were feeling in the midst of the, quote, Biden border crisis.
The minute even a small fraction of what those border towns deal with every day is brought to their front door, they all of a sudden go berserk.
Exactly.
And he would go on to repeat that Martha's Vineyard offers jobs, hotels, Airbnbs, by virtue of it being a sanctuary city.
What we find, however, in DeSantis' storytelling after the event is pure disinformation.
And if you're on social media, you might have seen a post like this one, which says Martha's Vineyard leftists declared a humanitarian crisis and deported the immigrants after only 24 hours.
Now, is that right?
No, not at all.
First things first, CNN reported that volunteers on Martha's Vineyard were really welcoming, frankly, housing them at a local Episcopal church and providing them with food and water and other essentials.
But the island is not equipped with the kind of infrastructure the migrants could use long term.
There's no year-round homeless shelter, and the island is in the middle of a housing crisis.
The Washington Post even reported that some doctors can't even afford to live there anymore.
So the Massachusetts governor, who's a Republican by the way, came up with a plan to transport them to a military base on Cape Cod.
The migrants were not deported.
Being deported means someone was sent back to their home country and that's not what happened here.
And it's why the Truth Media rates that Instagram post false.
Well, the issue is that that's not exactly what sanctuary cities do.
And Martha's Vineyard is not a sanctuary city.
It's not even a city to begin with.
Wait, so if it's not even a city...
That means it couldn't even pass the policies that would make it a sanctuary city, right?
Alright, I'm getting kind of confused here.
Yeah, and that's all part of anti-sanctuary city messaging here.
Obfuscation and half-truths.
I mean, Massachusetts isn't even a sanctuary state, as DeSantis had claimed.
Sure, the Democrat-controlled state legislature tried to pass a sanctuary legislation.
But Republican Governor Charlie Baker opposed the measure, noting, quote, Our administration does not support making the Commonwealth a sanctuary state.
Okay, so this is clearly a case in which sanctuary, quote unquote, lived on in the imagination of high-ranking anti-immigrant politicians.
As being associated with so-called elite liberal cities of the North.
Exactly.
It seems most likely that DeSantis relied on FAIR's characterization of Massachusetts' sanctuary status.
FAIR, along with Floridians for Immigration Enforcement, drafted the original version of Florida's SB 168, touted by supporters as an, quote, anti-sanctuary cities law.
DeSantis signed this bill in July 2019, intent on punishing any jurisdiction that was already a sanctuary.
Man.
And if there's one thing we've been made aware of in this age of social media, it's that disinformation is a pretty powerful tool.
That's right.
I mean, it's hard to imagine that DeSantis, a graduate of Harvard Law School, actually read any sanctuary ordinances or resolutions and reasonably concluded that sanctuary jurisdictions promise all these things that he purports.
Airbnbs, jobs, etc., etc.
Yeah, and here's the important takeaway, of course.
Disinformation hurts us as a democracy, but more immediately, it was harming immigrants and migrants.
Exactly.
The children, women, and men who were manipulated have seen firsthand how disinformation begets dehumanization, all for a political ploy.
And Lloyd, I suppose we shouldn't have been surprised by DeSantis' stunt in Massachusetts.
Since he stepped into the governor's mansion in Florida, which was always really just a stepping stone for his presumption for larger office, he's made anti-immigrant grandstanding central to his political identity.
Oh, absolutely.
He's turned Florida into a laboratory for right-wing causes.
Yep.
And always with an eye towards the White House, he figured to make his national brand by stirring up dirt and inviting confrontations on some of our country's most pressing social issues.
He's led the way in restricting access to abortion, rolling back diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in higher education, and then of course passing legislation on LGBTQ issues like the Don't Say Gay Law, which forbids instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in K-12 schools.
But on immigration, the topic we're really here to talk about...
He worked to burnish a national reputation as the rights champion against that so-called Biden's border crisis.
Governor DeSantis said today that he's deploying members of the Florida State Guard and the Florida National Guard both to Texas.
And the plan now is to help them assist Texas officials to try to get a better handle on the spike in undocumented immigrants right now that are crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2023 alone, he grabbed the media spotlight by sending Florida National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.
Filing legal challenges against federal immigration policies.
And then, of course, in his most dramatic move, that stunt to send asylum seekers to Martha's Vineyard.
Yikes.
Most of these were stunts, cruel ones, but mostly naked grandstanding that amounted to political theater.
Yeah, true.
But in the spring of 2023, he worked to move beyond that grandstanding and actually legislate.
Working with friendly Republican state legislators, DeSantis crafted an immigration omnibus bill that sought to make life in Florida untenable for the more than 775,000 immigrants without permanent legal status who call the state home.
The set of bills they crafted, combined, would have been some of the most restrictive and truly odious forms of immigration legislation that our country has seen in the last few decades.
That really harkens back to state-level initiatives like California's Proposition 187 and Arizona's SB 1070, and federal efforts like the Sensenbrenner bill introduced in 2005, all of which we've covered in our series.
Yeah, that's spot on.
And here's what they were going to do, Lloyd.
Florida's proposals were set out to ban out-of-state tuition waivers for undocumented students in higher education, require certain hospitals to inquire about a patient's immigration status, And would mandate that the state's law enforcement cooperate with federal immigration officers.
Perhaps most boldly, the law would have made it a third-degree felony to conceal, harbor, or transport an individual who has entered the country unlawfully, a violation punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.
And if I recall, that legislation quickly generated significant pushback from immigrant rights organizations in the state, right?
Yeah, that's correct.
That included the Florida Immigration Council, whose director, Tessa Pettitte, accused DeSantis and Republican state legislators of, quote, hate and heavy-handed use of government power to attack our vulnerable families, friends, and neighbors.
And significant pushback from faith leaders too, right?
Yeah, you better believe it.
the bill's vague definition of "harboring and transporting undocumented residents" brought forward the most vocal denunciations from a diverse group of churches and pastors.
Now, these leaders contended that services offered by faith groups, like providing parishioners transportation to mass and worship services, would make them criminals in the eyes of the state.
Oh man, this is sounding a lot like the origins of sanctuary.
Yeah, I'm hearing it too, Lloyd.
Hundreds of Latino evangelicals traveled to the state capitol, where they tried to meet with state leaders.
They sought to be, in the words of Reverend Ivan Garcia, proclaimers of hope for Florida's immigrants.
Shut out from the legislators' offices, however, they were forced to pray to stop the bill from becoming law.
As Gabriel Salguero, pastor of the Gathering Place and Assemblies of God Congregation pastor of the Gathering Place and Assemblies of God Congregation Orlando and founder of the
National Latino Evangelical Coalition remarked, the law would functionally, quote, criminalize the church's work.
Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami, meanwhile, who had criticized DeSantis' rhetoric and policies on immigration of the past, painted the law in even starker terms.
He warned that it would, quote, outlaw empathy for the state's undocumented residents.
But still, left unsaid in some of these denunciations is what religious leaders like Salguero and Wenski might actually do if this law is passed.
Clergy and people of faith across Florida could have been faced with a difficult decision.
Follow the law and end their support of undocumented congregants or defy the state.
This is sounding pretty familiar, Lloyd.
This was, of course, a choice that some Florida clergy actually began to consider.
Father Jose Rodriguez of the Episcopal Church of Jesus de Nazaret in Orlando put it plainly when he spoke to the Orlando Sentinel.
Some of us are going to have to make a choice.
Are we going to disobey an unjust law, or are we going to follow the letter of the law in hopes of being useful to the people we serve?
And it seems the case that, would they be called to disobey an unjust law, Florida's people of faith could have drawn on the work of the 1980s sanctuary activists.
Listeners might be surprised to hear this, but by 1987, Florida was home to two sanctuary congregations.
Miami's Our Lady of the Divine Providence entered the movement in 1983, followed by the Gainesville Area Task Force, which opened a site in a former Quaker meeting house four years later.
Fr.
Ernesto Garcia Rubio, pastor of Our Lady of Divine Providence, had already been administering to a growingly diverse Latino congregation before the start of the movement.
One that was predominantly Nicaraguan, but had offered special ministry to Cuban refugees who had arrived in the city in 1980 as part of the Mariel Exodus.
For him, entering the movement was merely an extension of his concept of Christian hospitality.
Garcia Rubio told the Miami Herald that his archbishop neither condoned nor sanctioned sanctuary, but had told the priest to, quote, practice the gospel.
Now, it's unclear if Florida's immigration activists or the pastors leading the charge against the 2023 bill were at all familiar with the 1980s sanctuary movement, or if they're summoning up sanctuary in the 80s as a sort of usable sacred history, as we discussed in our first episode.
But comments from Florida clergy, in opposition to DeSantis' immigration proposal, seemed to at least invoke the spirit of the movement, hinting at a potential new clash between church and state.
Speaking at a Tampa rally, Reverend Andy Oliver of the Allendale United Methodist Church warned that neither he nor his congregation would be deterred in providing shelter and aid to their undocumented congregants.
I have offered housing in my house to undocumented persons in the past.
We have done so at the church, and we will continue to do so, even if it's declared illegal, because it's the right thing to do.
Now, fortunately for Floridians of Faith, Those aspects of the legislation that would have made it a felony to assist a person living in the state without proper documentation were stripped from the final bill.
But much of the anti-immigrant legislation sailed through the statehouse before making it to DeSantis' desk.
To put it bluntly, Trump, DeSantis, and their ilk aren't through with trying to dismantle sanctuary.
If anything, we're just witnessing in real time how these forces are adapting to any pushback to their anti-sanctuary policies.
That's right.
We need not look any further than what we would call shadow platforms for the movement.
These aren't the official RNC policy statements voted on by party delegates, but rather the policy aspirations created by conservative think tanks.
Initiatives like Agenda 47 and the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 lay out pretty clearly a vision for a magnified federal government.
Is a bit different, however, from Project 2025 in that it's the official platform of the Trump campaign and it can be found on the very website donaldjtrump.com.
Agenda 47 outlines in its order of business for day one as president, a charge to end sanctuary cities.
And Project 2025, a shadow platform that Trump has tried to craftily distance himself from, is very similar in spirit with some...
Let's say interesting appropriation of religious language and history.
Yeah, you could say that again.
Project 2025 cites the renowned German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer of all people in laying out its anti-immigrant platform.
Oh, what?
All right.
It sounds like we should hear a bit more about that.
Yeah, this is an extended section, but because it's so inane, I think it's worth reading the entire thing, Lloyd.
Here's what the platform reads.
All right.
Quote.
That's why today's progressive left so cavalierly supports open borders despite the lawless humanitarian crisis their policy created along America's southern border.
They seek to purge the very concept of the nation-state from the American ethos, no matter how much crime increases or resources drop for schools and hospitals or wages decrease for the working class.
Open borders activism is a classic example of what German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer called "cheap grace," publicly promoting one's own virtue without risking any personal inconvenience.
Indeed, the only direct impact of open borders on pro-open borders elites is that the constant flow of illegal immigration suppresses the wages of their housekeepers, landscapers, and busboys.
And as Rev. Angela Denker has noted, this is a troubling continuing appropriation of the Lutheran theologian Yeah, I would say so.
It seems to be a willful misrepresentation of Bonhoeffer, who in his concept of cheap grace was actually calling out hypocrites who might be liars and thieves in their daily lives, but think that their wealth and power and their public profession of faith in Christ guaranteed them salvation.
Misreadings or not?
All of it provides a cheap veneer of religious legitimacy to a pretty radical political platform.
And Lloyd, not surprisingly, sections like this within Project 2025 add structure to Trump's immigration platform, including a continuation of an attack on sanctuary jurisdictions.
All right.
So I don't think it's too much of a stretch to note that there is, let's say, misappropriation or even misidentification of sanctuary happening at a pretty egregious and rapid clip here.
I'd have to agree with you there.
You've got governors defining sanctuary in a way that is strictly beneficial to their own political ends.
You know, building a political platform through the demonization of immigrants.
And now you've got think tanks misusing theology in a way to meet their own ends.
And any student of politics probably wouldn't be surprised by much of this.
But, now that we're at our final episode of the series, I would imagine our listeners would like to know where we, two historians, want to take this.
