Tag Archives: Immigrants

Immigrant Families: We Can All Afford to Live With Dignity

Immigrant Families: We Can All Afford to Live With Dignity

Cruel cuts to vital services come at a time of soaring costs for those who need it the most

 

Giovana Oaxaca
August 11, 2025

The recently passed budget reconciliation bill diverts resources from communities to mass deportation efforts and border militarization. In this third installment of a three-part series (Part 1, Part 2), Giovana Oaxaca, NETWORK Senior Government Relations Advocate for Immigration, explores how the bill cruelly cuts services to vital services, but also the road ahead that justice-seekers can pursue to defeat these measures.

In communities across the country, working families are already grappling with rising costs. Groceries, rent, childcare, and health care have all surged in price (and will continue to do so thanks to the recently passed budget bill), leaving many households struggling to make ends meet. Yet, Congress will deepen the hardship by stripping away vital support from those who need them most. 

Sisters of St. Joseph of Brentwood, NY hold a sign at a June event on Capitol Hill at which Catholic Sisters strongly opposed the budget reconciliation bill.

This bill proposes to render many qualifying and lawfully present immigrants ineligible for vital programs while simultaneously slashing these programs by billions for U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents. Except for green card holders, individuals residing in the U.S. according to a Compact of Free Association, and certain Cuban and Haitian entrants, the following programs will be severely restricted for non-citizens: 

  • Through passage of the budget reconciliation act, Congress ends Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) for many of the most vulnerable including refugees, asylees, and several others. 
  • Congress also ends subsidized ACA Marketplace coverage for asylees, refugees, people with Temporary Protected Status, and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients beginning on January 1, 2027. Furthermore, all lawfully present immigrants with incomes under 100 percent of the FPL would be rendered ineligible for ACA marketplace coverage beginning on January 1, 2026
  • Despite promises to protect Medicare, the bill quietly strips access from many eligible immigrants. This means those who had coverage at the time of the bill will have their coverage end after January 4, 2027. This move leaves thousands of ageing individuals without the care they’ve relied on.
  • Food insecurity is also poised to worsen. The bill would end food assistance for eligible immigrants receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
The Road Ahead

Harsh policies needlessly instill fear in communities and drive people deeper into the shadows. Common-sense immigration policies should uphold dignity, promote fairness and lawfulness, and prioritize meaningful reforms like a path to permanent legal status, not unnecessarily punish those who are in good standing in their communities as this administration has relentlessly done. Catholic Social Justice calls us to uphold the dignity of every human being. The real human costs of this immoral bill are undeniable. 

Legislation must bear in mind human dignity and the common good, the principle that every person should have the opportunity to live with dignity, contribute to society, and reach their God-given potential. The bills’ swift passage and lack of guidance create conditions ripe for abuse, including worsening overcrowding in detention facilities, fast-tracked deportations that bypass due process, and the hasty awarding of contracts without proper oversight.  

As Congress debates even more federal funding for ICE through the annual appropriations process, NETWORK is closely monitoring H.R. 4016, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2026 and H.R.4213 – Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2026, which increase funds related to enforcement, detention, and border security. This alarming increase in interior enforcement in our communities is coming at the expense of taxpayers and family unity, and we must stand firm. 

Concerned people of faith can help support family unity and their communities by sharing know-your-rights materials and connecting with local community-based organizations, uphold dignity by supporting just policies like the restoration of sensitive locations policy guidance to ICE, and push for robust oversight and accountability from local and federal government officials and agencies.

Read Part 1 on immigration enforcement and detention.

Read Part 2 on how unfair government fees threaten family unity.

NETWORK Lobby Advocates for Catholic Social Justice

EPA Tries to Make Environmental Endangerment a Non-Issue

EPA Tries to Make Environmental Endangerment a Non-Issue

We Declare: Not On Our Watch

 

Drake Starling
August 20, 2025

In a move as reckless as it is radical, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin recently announced that the EPA will revoke the Endangerment Finding, the foundational scientific determination that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare.  

The administration’s action is a full-scale assault on clean air, clean water, clean energy, and public health – fundamental basics that we all need to thrive. If finalized, this decision would obliterate the legal basis for federal climate action and, with it, the power to protect people and our planet from pollution, disaster, and exploitation. Think drinking water that can kill you! 

NETWORK Lobby Advocates for Catholic Social Justice

Let’s break it down: 

No Endangerment Finding = No Climate Protections

 Without it, the EPA cannot limit greenhouse gas emissions from cars, trucks, power plants, or oil and gas operations. That means more tailpipe pollution, more smog, and more soot in the air our children breathe. It means more asthma attacks, more emergency room visits, and more premature deaths, especially in low-income communities and communities of color already burdened by industrial pollution. 

No Climate Rules = Dirtier Water and Weaker Storm Protections

 Warmer temperatures fueled by unchecked carbon pollution mean rising sea levels, stronger hurricanes, and intensified rainfall. This leads to flooded sewage systems, contaminated drinking water, and overwhelmed infrastructure. Repealing the Endangerment Finding weakens our ability to mitigate these impacts and leaves vulnerable communities to fend for themselves when a climate disaster strikes. 

EPA Authority = No Clean Energy Transition 

 Administrator Zeldin’s proposal not only targets car emissions, it sets the stage for dismantling rules that encourage clean energy and efficiency. That means more fossil fuels, fewer wind and solar projects, and fewer clean energy jobs in communities that desperately need them. It also means people in the U.S. will spend more to fill up their cars. This radical policy change comes just as we’re finally seeing the benefits of electric vehicles and clean technology take root. 

No Accountability = No Future

This rollback erases 15 years of progress and legal precedent. It ties the hands of future presidents, public health officials, and EPA scientists. The big institutional shareholders win again. Furthermore, it tells the world loud and clear that the U.S. is once again backing out of its moral and global responsibilities to lead in this urgent space.  

And For What?

The EPA claims this action is justified by a fringe research report commissioned from five climate denialists who say carbon dioxide helps plants grow. They argue—absurdly—that U.S. transportation emissions don’t matter because they’re “too small” to affect global temperatures. Never mind that transportation is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the country. Never mind that if our vehicle sector were a country, it would be the fourth-largest emitter on Earth. Never mind the 7 billion metric tons of emissions that were set to be avoided under the standards this would undo.  

This isn’t about science. It’s about ideology. Administrator Zeldin, once a coastal Republican concerned about sea-level rise, now says he wants to “drive a dagger through the heart of climate–change religion.” This is a far cry from the monumental progress the U.S. made in the mid-20th century by investing in efforts to clean waterways, beautify highways, and vastly eliminate environmental lead emissions. It was Richard Nixon, a Republican president, who created the EPA in 1970. 

Let us be clear!

Climate justice is not a religion, but a moral responsibility — and one we must not abandon.  

At NETWORK, we know that those of us most harmed by climate inaction are the same people our faith prioritizes: those of us in poverty, who are ill, elderly, displaced, or disabled people. We also recognize the damage future generations will inherit the consequences of our choices. 

This decision would mean more pollution in our lungs, more toxins in our water, more wildfires, more displacement, and more loss. We reject this false choice between environmental protection and economic freedom.  We reject this corrupt inversion of public service that prioritizes polluters over people.  We reject this cowardly attempt to pretend the climate crisis does not exist.  

The EPA has opened a public comment period on this proposal. And we plan to make our voices heard. In partnership with Franciscan Action Network, Catholic Climate Covenant, Maryknoll, the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, NETWORK is organizing a public comment letter telling the EPA that as people of faith, we reject the EPA’s rescission of the Endangerment Finding. Add your name here and tell the EPA to keep the Endangerment Finding and protect our air, water, and our climate.  We will not sit by while the government tries to dismantle the very laws that protect God’s creation — and all of us who call it home. The only thing more dangerous than denying the climate crisis is denying our responsibility to confront it! 

Immigrant Families: What’s at Stake and How We Respond

Immigrant Families: What’s at Stake and How We Respond

Congress has allocated hundreds of billions of dollars to ramp up raids and detain thousands of our neighbors and loved ones at a massive taxpayer and moral cost

 

Giovana Oaxaca
August 5, 2025

The recently passed budget reconciliation bill diverts resources from communities to mass deportation efforts and border militarization. As Congress raises spending, it is also reinforcing state and federal cooperation. Most of these funds will be spent before September 30, 2029. In this first of a three-part series, Giovana Oaxaca, NETWORK Senior Government Relations Advocate for Immigration, will address immigration in the bill. 

In cities across the country, ICE raids have become all too common, leaving families shattered and communities living in fear. But we don’t have to accept terror as the status quo. Immigrants, their families, neighbors, employers, and advocates are united in demanding respect for human dignity, protection of basic rights, and a government that serves the common good. NETWORK staff and advocates have been on the frontline of defending immigrant rights—turning the passage of recent legislation into a moral awakening.  

Giovana Oaxaca speaks at 2024 Nuns on the Bus & Friends launch.

Giovana Oaxaca, who now serves as NETWORK Senior Government Relations Advocate for Immigration, speaks at the 2024 Nuns on the Bus & Friends announcement. Photo: Larry French/AP Content Services for NETWORK Nuns on the Bus and Friends

To understand the most aggressive immigration crackdown in recent U.S. history, let’s unpack how the budget reconciliation will drive mass deportations that tear families apart; impose higher immigration fees on already burdened families; and cut health and food assistance, denying children and families the necessary resources they need to thrive.

Diverting Community Resources to Fund Mass Deportation Efforts

The rapid growth of the detention system is poised to continue. Congress provided $45 billion to expand adult and family immigration detention, enough to maintain 100,000 detention beds per day. The bill includes a $29.9 billion lump sum that can be used to hire 10,000 new ICE agents, upgrade facilities, detain families together, and expand the use of 287(g) agreements, among other uses. Another $5 billion for the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) could allow for continued repurposing of prisons for immigration detention. 

  • In the text of the bill, Congress failed to create guardrails to prevent the prolonged detention of children and their families, in potential contravention of the Flores Settlement Agreement. This puts the protection of children at even greater risk. 
  • On May 10, the Trump administration moved to terminate Flores, the landmark court order establishing the standards of treatment, care, and release of children in federal immigration custody. 

Another significant amount of funding ($3.32 billion) is allocated to the Department of Justice (DOJ) for hiring immigration judges, combatting drug trafficking, investigating and prosecuting immigration matters, supporting state and localities’ immigration enforcement efforts through community policing grants, and compensating states and localities for jailing immigrants. Congress effectively guarantees that the deportation infrastructure will be primed to deport one million people annually, ramping up kidnappings, accelerating the removal process, and raising barriers to relief. 

Entrenching State-Federal Cooperation

New programs created by Congress cement further state and local law enforcement collaboration on immigration enforcement, eroding trust in local law enforcement. 

The bill provides $3.5 billion for establishing a new grant program under the DOJ called the Bridging Immigration-related Deficits Experienced Nationwide (BIDEN) Reimbursement Fund, which states and localities can use for a range of purposes, including apprehending unlawfully present non-citizens who have committed crimes and for the criminal detention of non-citizens. State and local cooperation is emphasized with a further $2.055 billion lump sum created to fund hiring new Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents, deportations, enhanced screenings of immigrants, and the deportation of unaccompanied children from contiguous countries. It will also reimburse states and localities for various immigration and security efforts, providing for the deportation of unaccompanied children, expedited removal of non-citizens who have committed crimes, and screening unaccompanied children for possible gang affiliations. 

This spending allows deeper entanglement between state and local law enforcement and federal authorities. An additional $13.5 billion is allocated to states for border-related immigration enforcement, $10 billion for a “State Border Security Reinforcement Fund,” and $450 million for Operation Stonegarten, which bolsters state and local law enforcement at the border. This further embeds state and local law enforcement into both administrative and criminal enforcement of immigration laws, blurring lines. 

This may contribute to the erosion of trust between local police and immigrant communities due to fear. In one survey, 35 percent of Latino parents said they planned to avoid talking to police or reporting crimes because of fear.

Ramping Up Deadly Border Enforcement

Under this legislation, $46.5 billion is provided for new and replacement border walls and barriers. Congress also makes $4.1 billion available to hire new Border Patrol agents, $2 billion to award bonuses, and $5 billion to make facility and checkpoint upgrades. Aside from the already provided amounts, $10 billion is provided to DHS for unspecified homeland security measures. Our tradition teaches that truth must precede reconciliation, and that repair is a spiritual discipline. As Pope Francis reminds us, “Every human being is precious.” That sacredness demands a public reckoning with the truth and a commitment to systemic transformation, so that all of us can thrive.

Part 2 of this series explores fairness for immigrant families.

 

Immigrant Families: Unfair Fees Jeopardize Family Unity

Immigrant Families: Unfair Fees Jeopardize Family Unity

Congress is making it harder to get and maintain lawful status, raising the stakes for blended families trying to stay together

 

Giovana Oaxaca
August 8, 2025

The recently passed budget reconciliation bill diverts resources from communities to mass deportation efforts and border militarization. As Congress raises spending, it is also undermining the immigration system, deliberately raising barriers to lawful status. Most of these provisions take effect immediately. In this second installment of a three-part series, Giovana Oaxaca, NETWORK Senior Government Relations Advocate for Immigration explores how the bill threatens family unity with costly fees that, in conjunction with the Trump administration’s efforts to strip people of their status, create a legal minefield for many families.

Across the nation, blended families are navigating a huge immigration bureaucracy despite heightened enforcement targeting people following legal procedures at courthouses and check-ins. At the same time, through a series of fee hikes included in the bill, Congress is raising the cost of applying for and maintaining certain types of lawful status and work authorization, raising the stakes even more.  

Sr. Deirdre Griffin, SSJ listens to Yesenia Lacayo of Mission Action in San Francisco during the 2024 Nuns on the Bus & Friends tour.

Sr. Deirdre Griffin, SSJ listens to Yesenia Lacayo of Mission Action in San Francisco during the 2024 Nuns on the Bus & Friends tour. The organization supports individuals and families with housing, immigration, health and wellness, and work resources. Photo: Jacob Schatz, CCR Studios

The fees in question will have a disproportionate impact on at-risk adults and families filing for humanitarian protection. These exorbitant fees mean that low- and moderate–income immigrant families will face new hurdles to securing stability and safety. Coupled with the Trump administration’s efforts to negate birthright citizenship and strip lawful status of numerous humanitarian migrants, family unity is under widespread attack.

  • The Trump administration has aggressively moved to take individuals with lawful status and valid work authorization and attempted to render them deportable.  
  • This has been attempted, with Supreme Court often intervening to permit the administration to carry out, with 500,000 CHNV humanitarian parole beneficiaries, Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders from Haiti (348,000), Venezuela (350,000), Afghanistan (11,700), Cameroon, Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua (60,000).  
  • The Trump administration has also ratcheted up criminal charges for civil immigration violations, measures that increase vulnerability to deportation for immigrants. 

The bill would impose a minimum $100 fee for asylum and $550 for work permit applications—a first in U.S. history—posing a barrier for many, including trafficking survivors and those fleeing persecution. Asylum seekers, parole beneficiaries, and individuals seeking Temporary Protected Status would pay an initial fee and $275 annually to renew work permits sufficiency. To make matters worse, many of these fees are minimums, meaning the Administration could charge more than what is listed in the bill. And the bill removes various waivers. 

The proposed fees would be especially burdensome for immigrants seeking benefits adjudicated through the immigration court system, adding significant barriers to relief. This includes for example, applications for Green Cards, waivers of inadmissibility, appeals of immigration judge decisions, and other related proceedings. In all, it paints a picture that is grossly unfair, in addition to the already unjust and gut-wrenching toll that enforcement measures place on immigrant families and communities. 

The immense bureaucracy that families and individuals are facing is itself concerning but turning our backs on families and individuals trying to follow legal processes is unjust and counterproductive.

Part 3 of this series will address the needs of families to live with dignity.

Read Part 1 on immigration enforcement and detention.

Sr. Eilis McCulloh, HM, speaks at a reparations vigil in Cleveland in June 2022.

The Welcoming Call

The Welcoming Call 

Solidarity with Migrant People is Intrinsic to the Vocation of Catholic Sisters

Sr. Eilis McCulloh, HM
August 1, 2023
Sr. Eilis McCulloh, HM, pictured with Eilis, amember of the Congolese community in Cleveland, Ohio.

Sr. Eilis McCulloh, HM, pictured with Eilis, a member of the Congolese community in Cleveland, Ohio.

For generations, Catholic Sisters in the U.S. have served alongside immigrant communities. Time and again, we have responded to the call to open our homes and hearts to meet the needs of families seeking asylum or newly arrived refugees. Our sisters and our communities have sponsored refugees, opened service agencies, taught English as a second language (ESL), served along the border, accompanied individuals and families, represented them in court, and advocated for just immigration policies. In so many ways, we have lived the call in Scripture to welcome the stranger and love our neighbor as ourselves.  

My own story of ministry is a part of this multi-generational call. In 2010, I began my own journey working with the Somali refugee community in St. Cloud, Minn. In subsequent years, I ministered alongside people from Bhutan, Iraq, Afghanistan, Burma (Myanmar), Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guatemala, and so many other countries. I learned about the asylum system in Immokalee, Fla. and witnessed the conditions that force a person to flee their homeland in Haiti or Guatemala. My own community, the Sisters of the Humility of Mary, remains connected through the sponsorship of Mary’s House in Cleveland. This work connects me with generations of sisters who have felt this call.  

Ministering alongside asylum seekers, refugees, DACA recipients, and other immigrants has shifted the way many of us Sisters understand immigration policy. We can no longer distance ourselves from the dangerous anti-immigrant rhetoric that has energized lawmakers to pass legislation to shut down and militarize the border, expand Title 42, deport asylum seekers from Haiti, or create an app that only recognizes white faces. 

These horrible policies impact the people who are a part of my extended community. They affect our neighbors. They affect members of our own family. We no longer have the luxury of waiting for Congress to fix the broken immigration system; we must do our part to ensure that a just and equitable immigration system remains at the forefront of our representatives’ minds.  

It was this sense of urgency that drove over 100 sisters and associates and their sponsored ministries to Washington DC in December 2021 to march for, pray for, and call for the end of Title 42. At that event, Sisters shared stories of ministering at the border, in Florida with the Haitian community, and in cities across the country. We shared a common understanding that our lives are forever changed by time spent ministering in El Salvador, Honduras, and many other countries. 

We shared with each other our own experiences of accompanying a family seeking asylum, only to watch helplessly as they were turned away by Border Patrol, or telling an individual that, according to current policy, they do not have a valid asylum claim even though a return to their home country would most certainly result in death. We also shared about moments of community — of shared meals of pupusas or beans and rice that made the Body of Christ a tangible offering that widened our understanding of community. All of these moments further strengthened our deeply held belief that the country’s immigration system needs an overhaul. 

As women religious, our individual community’s charism informs how we respond to the call to minister alongside our country’s diverse immigrant communities and advocate for justice. While our ministerial actions might vary, we all believe that all people, no matter their country of origin, economic status, family composition, gender or sexual orientation, or reason for migrating, deserve the opportunity to apply for asylum.  

This is the foundation of our belief as Christians: that all people reflect the Imago Dei — the image of the loving God who created them. Therefore, we will continue to call on our elected officials to stop playing politics with the lives of our immigrant siblings and create an immigration system that works for all people. 

Sr. Eilis McCulloh, HM is NETWORK’s Education and Organizing Specialist and a co-host of the podcast Just Politics, produced in collaboration between NETWORK and U.S. Catholic magazine.  

This column was published in the Quarter 3 2023 issue of Connection. 

DACA Heads to the Supreme Court

DACA Heads to the Supreme Court

Giovana Oaxaca
October 16, 2019

The executive action known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) has withstood a number of legal challenges over the years. In a few short weeks, however, the delicate future of more than 700,000 DACA recipients will face yet another test. On November 12, 2019, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments for the DACA cases that the Supreme Court is considering to review this fall term. Although there exist legislative solutions, such as the Dream and Promise Act which passed the House and the Dream Act and SECURE Act (introduced in the Senate), Congress has so far failed to pass meaningful protections for undocumented immigrants eligible for deferred action and temporary protected status. This has deferred the DACA matter to court cases, which have put a halt to the Trump administration’s decision to terminate DACA in September 2017. The Supreme Court’s decision will have far-reaching effects by deciding the fate of the program for the near future.

The stakes have never been higher. In a recent survey, over fifty percent of DACA recipients reported that they fear being detained or deported from the United States at least once a day. An even greater share of DACA recipients surveyed reported that they feared being separated from their children. The Supreme Court’s decision will alter the reality for the millions of DACA recipients living and working in the U.S. If the Supreme Court rules with the Trump Administration, this would leave thousands stranded with few recourses, in the very place they call home.

Brief Overview

On September 5, 2017, the Trump administration announced that it was terminating DACA, a decision that was been met with instant legal pushback. More than ten cases were filed challenging the administration’s decision. After a number of judges issued preliminary injunctions protecting the program, the administration appealed to the Supreme Court.  Earlier this summer, the Supreme Court granted the administration’s petition, agreeing to hear arguments for three cases on November 12th, 2019. The Supreme Court’s ruling on the DACA cases and an array of other high-profile cases are expected in June 2020.

Speculated Outcomes

Legal advocates, allies, and organizations are bracing for the court’s ruling.

  • The court may conclude it may review the administration’s decision. It may then rule that the termination is unlawful or lawful. A ruling stating that the action was unlawful would be good for DACA recipients because it would mean that the administration should not have terminated DACA under its reasoning at the time. The court may rule that the administration’s decision was lawful. This would be bad for DACA recipients because it would mean the administration could begin rolling back the program. It is also possible that the court could find DACA itself unlawful at this time. This would mean that the government could stop accepting renewals of applications.
  • The Supreme Court may decide not to review the administration’s decision to terminate. A ruling along these lines would mean that the administration could commence rolling back the program; it could also mean that a future administration could reinstate it.

High-profile businesses, higher education institutions, former national security officials, and religious organizations have joined a litany of amicus briefs in support of DACA recipients. The plight of Dreamers clearly resonates with the majority of Americans. As it stands, an overwhelming majority of Americans support a pathway to citizenship. For now, the decision to stay DACA rests in the hands of the Supreme Court.