Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Sessions, Huckabee Sanders Cite Bible To Justify Detaining Migrant Children

Attorney General Jeff Sessions and White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders both cited the Bible on Thursday to justify the Trump administration’s policy of separating migrant children from their families at the southern border.

“Persons who violate the law of our nation are subject to prosecution,” Sessions said at a speech to law enforcement officers in Indiana. “I would cite you to the Apostle Paul and his clear and wise command in Romans 13 to obey the laws of the government because God has ordained them for the purpose of order. Orderly and lawful processes are good in themselves and protect the weak and lawful.”

When asked about Sessions’ quote at the daily White House press conference, Huckabee Sanders echoed the idea.

“It is very biblical to enforce the law, that is actually repeated a number of times throughout the Bible,” she said.

There is no law mandating or prohibiting separating migrant children from their families.

This angered many on Twitter, who cited their own biblical verses to castigate the policy.

Nearly 1,500 children have been separated from their families and placed at detention centers, where they are confined indoors for up to 22 hours per day. The practice has been criticized by numerous faith organizations, including 26 Jewish groups, who called the policy “unconscionable.”

Contact Aiden Pink at [email protected] or on Twitter, @aidenpink

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.