WHEN WE LOOK at the record numbers of migrants who are seeking refuge and asylum in the U.S. and the deplorable ways they have often been treated, it’s easy to lose faith. The U.S. immigration system seems so hopelessly broken, and hateful rhetoric and bad faith are so abundant among our politicians, that it can often feel as if there’s nothing we can do to fix it. Yet, if we take seriously both the Hebrew scripture command to welcome the stranger and Jesus’ call to treat migrant people as we would treat him (Matthew 25), then we cannot let ourselves succumb to despair or resignation. People who have been forced to leave dangerous conditions in their home countries to seek asylum are depending on us to not give up fighting for a fairer and more humane immigration and asylum system. Sadly, Congress has lacked sufficient political will to pass the sweeping overhaul of our immigration laws that is so sorely needed.
Most Republicans in Congress continue to demagogue around immigration, stoking fear and xenophobia among their overwhelmingly white voter base. Many state-level GOP politicians have been as bad or worse, orchestrating cruel stunts such as sending buses of immigrants to cities thousands of miles from the border to score political points and passing laws such as Florida’s SB 1718, which (among other problematic aspects) criminalizes the transportation into the state of any immigrant people lacking documentation. Donald Trump centered his 2016 campaign and much of his presidency around open hostility to migrant people, and it’s almost guaranteed we’ll see an increase in toxic rhetoric on this issue in the months ahead. Meanwhile, the Democrats, including President Joe Biden, have been unwilling to confront our broken immigration system with the urgency and humaneness that migrants deserve. In fact, the Biden administration replaced the controversial Title 42 with a new rule that will make it difficult for people facing persecution to apply for asylum and is reportedly still contemplating reinstating family detention. Actions like these betray an uncomfortable level of similarity between Biden’s immigration policies and those of his predecessor.
There is still a great deal that Biden can do to improve the situation for people seeking safety and a new life in the United States. For better and worse, Congress has entrusted broad powers to the president on immigration. We know this all too well from the cruel immigration policies the Trump administration put into place without congressional approval. Biden, by contrast, has fortified the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, expanded humanitarian protection through Temporary Protected Status, significantly reduced interior deportations compared to his predecessors, increased the use of alternatives to detention programs, and begun strengthening the immigration court infrastructure to address the extreme backlog. Other measures like these are needed on a much greater scale.
Sojourners remains committed to pushing this administration to write a new legacy of humane, effective immigration policy and to address the current crisis without compromising our core values. And we’ll continue to work for more permanent and sustainable solutions.
Rev. Adam Russell Taylor is president of Sojourners and author of A More Perfect Union: A New Vision for Building the Beloved Community. Follow him on Bluesky @revadamtaylor.
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