U.S. Border Patrol agent apprehend migrants who surrendered to him after crossing the Rio Grand River in El Paso Texas on March 18, 2019 (U.S. Customs and Border Protection/Mani Albrecht/Public Domain)
By Mark Pattison
Sep 5 2023
The Republican Party in the House of Representatives is taking aim at Catholic Charities in the Rio-Grande Valley along the Texas-Mexico border for its shelter services to migrants who cross the border.
Last December, when it was apparent Republicans would win a House majority, three Republicans wrote to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas complaining that the Biden administration was “allowing non-governmental organizations … the freedom to aid and abet illegal aliens.”
In a separate letter, they wrote to Catholic Charities USA, demanding that it preserve documents “related to any expenditures submitted for reimbursement from the federal government related to migrants encountered at the southern border” in case the new House Republican leadership came calling.
The Catholic Charities letter was sent to two other faith-based social service organizations: Jewish Family Service and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.
In May, Mayorkas got another letter from three Republicans, including Rep Jim Jordan of Ohio, the Judiciary Committee chairman, accusing the charitable groups that use federal funds to aid immigrants of creating an “incentive” for illegal immigration and demanded access to a broad swath of records about Homeland Security funding practices.
Also in May, the House passed, along party lines, the Secure the Border Act.
It included a provision that would cut all funding to the Shelter Services Program administered by Homeland Security.
The Democratic-led Senate has not acted on the bill — and probably won’t.
In a party-split Congress, partisans in one chamber will push through legislation that can be exploited for future electoral — or re-electoral — advantage, including to tarnish the opposition.
According to Bloomberg Government, Rep. Tom Tiffany, a Republican from Wisconsin, recently called for Catholic Charities USA to testify before the Judiciary Committee to explain “what they’re doing down on the border to facilitate this illegal immigration.”
“It’s time to defund the bishops”
But that doesn’t stop some who have a bone to pick with the US Church.
One of those critics is the website Church Militant, which organized a July 20 rally outside the bishops’ Washington headquarters. A voiceover introducing a half-hour promotion for the rally on Church Militant said “it’s time to defund the bishops, and stop their unholy alliance with the Democratic Communist Party.”
At the National Press Club in Washington the day of the rally, a Church Militant offshoot called the Deposit of Faith Coalition accused the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops of “standing with Marxists,” and urged Congress to stop giving grants to the bishops and to Catholic Charities.
One speaker at the rally was Sheena Rodriguez, who founded the Alliance for a Safe Texas in 2021, after Joe Biden became president. In a phone interview from her car in Texas’ hill country, she said the group is funded by “people who know the work that I do” and “believe in the cause.”
Rodriguez said she gets flak “all the time” for being a Hispanic who wants to keep other Hispanics out of the U.S. “‘I’m speaking out against my people.’ That’s the rap that I get. … But in fairness, so does the majority of the Border Patrol. It doesn’t bother me.”
Sheena Rodriguez wants a funding cutoff to religious charities; she had testified to that effect to the House in April. “Until they provide more transparency in their funding and where their dollars are being spent, there needs to be an investigation done in the state and federal level to see what all this money is being used for and to see their actual role,” she said while driving. “A lot of the NGOs are affiliated with international NGOs at the U.N., and we need to stop funding the UN for the purposes of global migration.”
The right feed somebody
But Sister Norma Pimentel, the executive director of Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley, begs to differ. She does not think Catholic Charities is in the cross-hairs of politicians.
“Not at all. Not at all, by no means,” she said.
Assertions by politicians are incorrect, said Sister Pimentel, a Missionary of Jesus nun. “We help everybody who moves to our center by the Border Patrol. They have been processed. They have been given papers to remain in the U.S. temporarily. They are brought to us by the Border Patrol or by ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement) or by Customs. They have been processed, they have been vetted and they have permission to proceed … so they can continue that journey.” She added, “They are legally in the U.S. at the point when we see them.”
That number is currently about 250 families a day, down from the all-time high of close to 2,000 people in 2019, before the pandemic. “It’s not illegal to help somebody to help move forward with their journey. And therefore, helping them is not aiding and abetting. You have a right to feed somebody,” she said. “We’re not breaking any laws if so you give them water and food.”
For those immigrants who get to the Catholic Charities center on their own, “and they haven’t been in contact with Immigration or Border Patrol to get processed,” Sister Pimentel said, “then they need to do that. Somebody arriving in those conditions, we will tell them you have two options. You can either allow us to call the Border Patrol or continue your journey walking, because we can’t help you at this point.” – La Croix International
