Activists Are Invoking Religious Freedom to Save Migrants’ Lives
For The Nation, Stephanie Russell-Kraft writes that a group of activists who provide water, food, and search-and-rescue missions to migrants on the Mexico–U.S. border is using the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) to defend themselves in court. Zaachila Orozco, a member of the organization No More Deaths, says that her deeply held religious beliefs drive her to help migrants. Russell-Kraft writes, “RFRA stipulates that the government can’t substantially burden a person’s exercise of religion, even if that burden comes from a general law that has nothing to do with religion.”