Polarized and Politicized: The White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives
Yesterday in a addressing a conference sponsored by the Bush administration’s White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, the President said that the faith-based office and its activities are, “bigger that politics.” This statement is Orwellian given all of the evidence that has clearly illustrated just how polarizing and politicized this office has been.
The President’s Faith-Based office has been all about politics. We need look no further than the voices of those who have worked for the president and have run this office over the Bush years. They have spoken of their frustrations with how politicized the office had become. They saw first-hand that the effort was, and is, more about politics and courting churches.
Unfortunately, the creation of the faith-based office as part of the Bush administration was never about creating a way to better advocate for, and better fund, successful partnerships with all federally funded social service programs; nor has it been about ensuring that programming, and the tax-payer dollars that are allocated for such programming, finds its way to those most in need of services and to those organizations that are most qualified to deliver such services. This is something that has disturbed many who have worked in the faith-based office over the years. on his experiences working for the president in the faith-based office tells the tale in great detail.
The Administration can spew what appears on the surface to be impressive numbers, but it rings no more true than the in Iraq. Sadly, the faith-based office added little value, less accountability and a whole lot of government-funded discrimination. Yes, of course, one of our chief complaints about this president’s faith-based office is that it does not ensure that ALL organizations receiving government dollars be required to protect the constitutional and civil rights of those receiving services and all employees working in these programs.
The Bush administration has eviscerated most of the safeguards that had successfully protected the independence of churches, while also protecting the rights that all Americans have to expect equal treatment when they apply for a government-funded job or when they participate in a government-funded service. This office and this administration have actually promoted discrimination. No one should have to face government-sanctioned and government-funded religious discrimination when applying for a job or when receiving services funded by the government. Should a social worker who is not the "right" religion be excluded or fired from a government funded job because he or she is not of the right religion or has violated a tenet of their religion? Of course not. Discrimination based on religion goes against a core American value.
It is not just the discriminatory behavior of the office. It is the lack of fiscal accountability that disturbs me. It is hard to believe that any taxpayer would find it acceptable that the faith-based office is not holding all grantees accountable for where our dollars are going and how they are being used. It has become clear to those who have spent years trying to figure out the specific details of where the money has gone, how it has been spent program-by-program and how successful these programs have been is impossible to track—because in many cases that information does not currently exist. For example, I don’t think I need to bother running through all of the documented examples of the misuse, lack of accountability and sheer thievery that occurred following the dumping of funds into random programs following Katrina. Just as we know of the rampant government-funded discrimination that has occurred over the years.
At the end of the day, the real issue is not whether or not an office that helps coordinate and advocate for more and better resources for those in need is necessary, many will continue to debate and discuss its value. However, one thing is clear no matter what is decided; this office should not function as a political tool that panders to and attempts to buy off support from religious communities.
Have you noticed that rarely does anyone—including the Bush Administration ever add the words “…and 'community initiatives'” when they speak of this office? This is more than telling. As they say…the devil is always in the details…and that is definitely the problem with the current administration’s misuse of its faith-based office.
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
Free Speech
National Security
ACLU and Partners Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok BanACLU and Partners Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok Ban
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
National Security
Religious Liberty
ACLU Statement on New White House Strategy to Counter IslamophobiaACLU Statement on New White House Strategy to Counter Islamophobia
WASHINGTON – The Biden administration today released the first-ever national strategy to counter Islamophobia and related forms of bias and discrimination, including hate against Arab, Sikh, and South Asian Americans. In advance of the strategy, American Civil Liberties Union and its partners had urged the administration to overhaul government programs that reflect anti-Muslim discrimination. In particular, we have called for urgent action to constrain governmental agencies from continuing to exercise their authorities and technology to wrongly surveil and investigate, watchlist, and question and detain Muslims at the border, as well as deny immigration benefits to people from Muslim-majority countries. While the White House raised expectations that many of these issues would be addressed, the final strategy ended up falling far short. The following is a statement from Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU’s National Security Project: “While this strategy acknowledges discrimination and its harms, it does little to end them and is a squandered opportunity. For decades, American officials have invoked national security to pass laws and implement programs that disproportionately harm Muslims and people perceived to be Muslim. A serious anti-discrimination strategy would concretely address multiple bias-infused government practices that deny our communities equal participation in civic life and our democracy, like federal watchlisting, surveillance, and investigation. We’re profoundly frustrated that the administration didn’t take even the basic, overdue step of recognizing that anti-Muslim discrimination is uniquely normalized and embedded in government policies.” -
VirginiaDec 2024
National Security
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Our client, Nizar Trabelsi, is in the United States against his will. The federal government brought him here from Belgium more than a decade ago and charged him with terrorism-related crimes. At trial, the government’s case failed: a federal jury found Mr. Trabelsi not guilty. But instead of allowing Mr. Trabelsi to return to Belgium after his acquittal, the United States placed him in highly restrictive immigration detention and began an ongoing effort to force him to Tunisia, where he was born and where he will very likely be tortured. Mr. Trabelsi’s detention violates the Constitution, immigration law, and the extradition treaty between the United States and Belgium. Through this lawsuit, he seeks to return to Belgium, and he demands an immediate improvement of his detention conditions. -
Press ReleaseDec 2024
National Security
Immigrants' Rights
Federal Judge Rejects Acquitted Man’s Argument That His Immigration Detention Is UnlawfulFederal Judge Rejects Acquitted Man’s Argument That His Immigration Detention Is Unlawful
ALEXANDRIA, Va. — This week, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that the court does not have jurisdiction to decide whether the government can continue to detain Nizar Trabelsi, a Tunisian national who was brought to the United States against his will for prosecution and was cleared of all charges last year. The ruling means the United States will be able to continue to detain Mr. Trabelsi while it attempts to deport him to Tunisia, where he was born and where, as an immigration judge ruled earlier this year, he will likely face torture. The court also concluded that even if it did have jurisdiction over Mr. Trabelsi’s case, his claims challenging the government’s detention of him would fail. “Reviewing claims that the government is holding someone unlawfully is at the core of the judicial function, and we’re heartbroken for our client that the court got this so wrong,” said Brett Max Kaufman, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Center for Democracy. “The government’s arguments in defense of Mr. Trabelsi’s detention makes a hash of the Constitution, immigration laws, and its own extradition treaty.” In 2013, the United States forcibly extradited Mr. Trabelsi from Belgium to face criminal charges in the United States. In July 2023, after almost 10 years of highly restrictive pretrial detention, a federal jury cleared Mr. Trabelsi of all charges. But instead of releasing Mr. Trabelsi or returning him to Belgium, the U.S. transferred him to immigration detention, wrongly treating him as an applicant for admission and placing him in the deportation process. Over the years, the Belgian government has issued multiple formal diplomatic requests asking the U.S. to facilitate his return, but the U.S. has refused to send him back. Mr. Trabelsi filed a lawsuit challenging the government's authority to detain him. He also sought immediate improvements to his detention conditions. Those claims were not part of the court’s ruling today, and will continue to be litigated on a separate track. “Mr. Trabelsi only wants to return to Belgium after being illegally extradited to the United States, held for ten years, and then acquitted by a jury of any crimes,” said Nicole Hallett, clinical professor of law and director of the Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at the University of Chicago Law School. “He cannot be held indefinitely and we will continue to fight to make sure that justice ultimately prevails.” Mr. Trabelsi is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the University of Chicago Law School’s Immigrants’ Rights Clinic, the ACLU of Virginia, and Professor Jonathan Hafetz of Seton Hall Law School. The complaint in Trabelsi v. Crawford was filed against Jeffrey Crawford, warden of the Farmville Detention Center where Mr. Trabelsi is being held; Liana Castano, ICE field office director for the Washington Field Office; Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security; and Merrick Garland, U.S. attorney general.