A federal court judge temporarily blocked Immigration and Customs Enforcement from conducting raids in and around some Baptist, Quaker, and Sikh houses of worship in a narrow ruling on February 24.
Judge Theodore Chuang of the U.S. District Court of Maryland, an Obama appointee, sided with the plaintiffs in a lawsuit that is similar to one filed on February 11 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, to which the Episcopal Church is a party.
Both lawsuits challenge the Trump administration’s Inauguration Day decision to revoke the Homeland Security Administration’s “protected area policies,” which date back to 2011 (though similar restrictions had been in place for decades).
These policies had restricted immigration enforcement in schools, places of worship, and hospitals. The Biden administration widened the scope of the policies in 2021 to include additional sensitive areas and occasions like weddings, funerals, and parades.
Chuang denied the plantiffs’ request for a temporary nationwide ban on enforcement at places of worship, and instead restricted the ruling’s scope to congregations represented in the lawsuit, about 1,700 places of worship in 35 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.
Parties in the suit included several Quaker bodies, the theologically progressive Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF), and Sikh Temple Sacramento. The groups were represented by Democracy Forward, a nonprofit legal firm based in the nation’s capital.
The lawsuit challenged Homeland Security’s policy change on religious-freedom grounds, claiming that the new enforcement system presents a threat that deters congregants from attending services, a violation of constitutional protections for the free exercise of religion and association.
Homeland Security’s new policy, unlike earlier policies, failed to acknowledge the significance of the free exercise of religion and to explain how the new enforcement provisions would protect the right, the plantiffs claimed.
Chuang’s ruling said that the religious groups filing the suit “have provided evidence that the willingness of their congregants to attend worship and participate in ministry services is presently being chilled, and that, particularly at CBF and the Sikh Temple, attendance at such activities has already declined.”
The plaintiffs also demonstrated, Chuang said, that the new policy posed burdens on the exercise of their particular beliefs about “communal worship, service to immigrants, and pacifism.” But he said they had not proved that all other religious institutions in the nation shared these beliefs and would be similarly burdened by the Trump administration’s enforcement policy.
Chuang also declined to rule broadly on the claims that the religious freedom had been infringed, and essentially invited Homeland Security to amend the current policy to protect free exercise.
“At this early stage of case, on the sensitive and fraught issue of when and under what circumstances law enforcement may intrude into places of worship to conduct warrantless operations, 2025 Policy’s lack of any meaningful limitations or safeguards on such activity likely does not satisfy these constitutional and statutory requirements as to Plaintiffs, and that a return to the status quo is therefore warranted until the exact contours of what is necessary to avoid unlawful infringement on religious exercise are determined later in this case.”
No ICE raids on worship services have been widely reported since the protected areas policy was lifted, but the United Methodist Church’s Church and Society Division issued a statement on February 17 condemning a February 8 incident in which ICE personnel allegedly confronted men exiting a hypothermia shelter hosted by a United Methodist church in Virginia.
“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. Religious institutions should not have to go to court to fight for the right to worship and associate freely that is enshrined in our Constitution,” said Skye Perryman, Democracy Forward’s president and CEO.
“Our plaintiffs represent a unique and diverse coalition of religious groups that have been at the forefront in protecting values of religious liberty for centuries. We are grateful to the court for acting to limit this unlawful and harmful policy.”
The Rev. Mark Michael is editor-in-chief of The Living Church. An Episcopal priest, he has reported widely on global Anglicanism, and also writes about church history, liturgy, and pastoral ministry.
