Trump's Anti-Immigrant Agenda Turns the Ancient Story of Passover Into a Modern One

An authoritarian ruler seeks to consolidate his own power by stirring up fear about an immigrant population.

“These people are not like us,” he declares. “They are a potential fifth column, likely to join with our enemies and destroy us from within!” “We can keep ourselves safe only by controlling and oppressing them.”

On Wednesday night, Jews sat down to the Passover seder and retold the ancient story of how our ancestors, once welcomed into Egypt as refugees from famine, were enslaved by a Pharaoh fearful of losing power, and ultimately liberated through divine and human actions.

The Passover story has been retold in Jewish homes for millennia. This year, the ancient story tragically sounds like today’s news.

Now, the Supreme Court is considering overturning a core principle that once allowed those fleeing violence and oppression, my own great grandparents included, to find refuge in the United States.

President Donald Trump built his election campaign around stirring up fear of immigrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers, and, over the past year, has ramped up detentions and deportations, canceled temporary protected status for nationals of multiple countries, flooded major American cities with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, and flouted US policy and international law by deporting people to third countries.

All these actions have been undertaken with intense cruelty. Families have been divided; mothers tackled in airports, on the streets, and in their homes; and people sent to prisons and to nations where they have no connections.

Now, the Supreme Court is considering overturning a core principle that once allowed those fleeing violence and oppression, my own great grandparents included, to find refuge in the United States.

The justices are deliberating on Noem vs. Al Otro Lado, which will determine the constitutionality of the US government’s policy of physically blocking asylum-seekers from presenting themselves at ports of entry along the Mexican border. Longstanding US law requires the government to allow asylum-seekers to request asylum at ports of entry, and to give these claims a fair hearing.

Instead, the US has been preventing asylum-seekers from even making a claim and instead forcing them back to Mexico, where they are often stranded without shelter, adequate food, or protection from violence.

All of the current Supreme Court justices identify as either Christian, mostly Catholic, or Jewish. We hope they look to our shared scripture as they consider their rulings.

The Torah commands the retelling of the story of slavery and liberation, and also specifies what lessons should be learned from this experience. “You shall not wrong or oppress the ger,” God commands, “for you were gerim in the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 22:20). The word ger (plural: gerim) most likely refers to a person who came from somewhere else to live among the Jewish people—in other words, an immigrant or a stranger. Versions of this directive appear 36 times in the Torah.

As God established a lasting covenant with the Jewish people, God also laid out a series of laws aimed at establishing a just society. Central among these are the commandments regarding just treatment of the ger, who “...should be treated equally under the law.” (Numbers 15:15)

God, Godself, cares for immigrants just as God cared for the Jewish people during the period of their slavery in Egypt. “[God] loves the ger, and gives them food and clothing.” (Deuteronomy 10:18) Acting as God acts demands not only protecting immigrants from oppression, but actively caring for their needs.

The Torah also offers a negative example of a society whose cruelty toward immigrants, travelers, and others in need condemns it to destruction. The evil city of Sodom is notorious for its inhospitality toward visitors. “This was the sin of your sister Sodom,” the prophet Ezekiel declares, “She and her daughters had plenty of bread and untroubled tranquility, yet they did not support the poor and the needy.” (Ezekiel 16:49)

The Talmud goes on to tell the story of one brave young woman who regularly sneaks food to a person in need, only to be tortured and killed once she is discovered.

These are the issues at stake in Noem vs. Al Otro Lado. When US officials turn asylum-seekers away at the border, rather than allowing them to plead their case, they are no different from the officials in Sodom who decreed, “Let us abolish the practice of traveling in our land.”

I've personally seen Jewish and other religious communities living out these ancient teachings. At the end of January, nearly 100 rabbis who are members of T’ruah, the organization I lead, half of whom live and work in Minnesota and half from out of state, joined some 600 other clergy to protest ICE in the Twin Cities.

These religious leaders are following the path that God has laid out, refusing to tolerate fearmongering or oppression of immigrants, and insisting on treating all people—whether born in the United States or elsewhere—justly, and according to a single legal code. The justices should do the same.