A FEDERAL investigation into the Episcopal diocese of Rio Grande, which runs a shelter for migrants, is “insulting”, the Bishop, the Rt Revd Michael Hunn, has said.
The United States’ Department of Homeland Security has written to inform the diocese of Rio Grande that its federal assistance has been stopped while the departement investigates what it describes as “concerns” that the funding may have supported “entities engaged in or facilitating illegal activities”.
The diocese’s Borderland Ministries team runs a shelter at St Christopher’s Episcopal Church, El Paso, which has previously housed up to 25 asylum-seekers brought to them by the US Border Patrol.
The diocese covers the US state of New Mexico and part of Texas. About 40 per cent of the US-Mexico border is in the diocese, and Borderland Ministries has been working with migrants for decades.
Bishop Hunn said that he was “insulted by the insinuation that we have been involved in anything illegal or immoral”. In a five-minute video, posted on YouTube, he said that the letter, which he read out, “insinuates we have been involved in human trafficking”.
The letter, dated Tuesday of last week, is signed by the acting administrator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Cameron Hamilton. It raises what it says are “significant concerns” that federal funding “is going to entities engaged in or facilitating illegal activities”.
“The department is concerned that entities receiving payment under this program may be guilty of encouraging or inducing an alien to come, to enter or reside in the United States in violation of law; transporting or moving illegal aliens; harboring, concealing or shielding from detection illegal aliens; or applicable conspiracy, aiding or abetting, or attempt liability.”
But Bishop Hunn said: “We in the Diocese of the Rio Grande have been practising our constitutionally guaranteed faith. We are following Jesus Christ by welcoming the stranger and loving our neighbour, and we have done so in partnership with the federal government.”
He said that listeners deserved to know the facts, and explained that the church shelter was one of a network of shelters that had worked with Customs and Border Protection to give temporary shelter to migrants claiming asylum and legally entering the US through the Mexican border. Migrants usually stay at the shelter for three days before being moved elsewhere while their asylum claim is processed.
Funding for some of the shelter’s costs came through the Biden administration’s Homeland Security’s Shelter and Services programme. The letter from Homeland Security informed the diocese that it would not get any funding, even for costs already incurred, the Bishop said.
The shelter at St Christopher’s has housed more than 1700 people in the years it has operated, but no migrants since December 2024, because of the reduction in border crossings.
“We are doing what our faith demands of us. Following Jesus Christ’s command that we welcome the stranger, love our neighbour, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and house those who have nowhere to go,” the Bishop said.
The diocese of Rio Grande told the Episcopal News Service that it was taking legal advice on its response to the letter.