Senators Divided Over ICE Detaining Immigrants at Church

On Monday, we asked 17 senators after ICE picked up a Honduran man over the weekend from a church service in Tucker, Georgia.

WASHINGTON—On Sunday, an ankle monitor went off on a Honduran man attending services at the Fuente de Vida church in Tucker, Georgia, about 15 miles outside of Atlanta. “Once he was outside, he couldn’t come back in because ICE agents arrested him and put him in handcuffs,” Pastor Luis Ortiz told Univision.

According to Ortiz, the agents were unable to enter the church because a security system was installed that only allows entry to those with the access code, precisely because they thought a raid could occur. "That was what prevented the agents from entering the church," the priest said in an interview with Telemundo Atlanta.

The incident is the first known immigration enforcement action at a church since Donald Trump returned to power in the White House a week ago. Immigration officials haven’t said why they targeted the Honduran church goer, specifically, but his detention was part of a series of nationwide enforcement actions over the weekend that officials say detained over 1,000 migrants.

On Monday, we asked eighteen senators whether churches should be sanctuaries from immigration agents, as they are in much of the western hemisphere. We have posted their responses below — 

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