"In the lead-up to the passage of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, political and religious leaders quoted scripture to justify shutting down food programs and kicking mothers and their babies off public assistance. Those leaders, many of them self-described Christians, chose to ignore the majority of passages in the Bible that preached "good news" to the poor and promised freedom to those captive to injustice and oppression."
"In July, there was the viral video from the Department of Homeland Security, using the "Here I am, Lord. Send me" quotation from Isaiah - commonly cited when ordaining faith leaders and including explicit references to marginalized communities impacted by displacement and oppression - to recruit new agents for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE, a job that now comes with a $50,000 signing bonus, thanks to Donald Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill.""
Thirty years ago, political and religious leaders cited scripture to justify the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, ending food programs and removing mothers and babies from public assistance. Many self-described Christians ignored biblical passages that promise good news to the poor and freedom to the oppressed, favoring unethical and ahistorical interpretations that supported American imperial power and punished the poor. Three decades later, the Trump administration and allied theologians employ biblical language to endorse aggressive immigration enforcement. A DHS recruitment video appropriated Isaiah's "Here I am, Lord. Send me" to recruit ICE agents, and ICE now offers a $50,000 signing bonus under the "One Big Beautiful Bill." Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth's former pastor publicly declared that the Bible favors ICE raids.
Read at Truthout
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