Progressive Voices for Change
Benjamin Guerrero Cruz is a High School soccer player from Van Nuys and had just celebrated his 18th birthday and was enjoying a peaceful moment with his dog on a summer evening. Suddenly, he was torn from his community, locked in a detention center so packed that prisoners can’t even sit or lie down comfortably.
You can’t lawfully pick and choose which people “count” when you’re deciding how political power and federal resources are distributed. That principle exists precisely to prevent officials from disenfranchising whole communities by redefining who counts as a person.
By framing deportations and ICE raids as divinely mandated, they seek to give their abuse of power a veneer of righteousness, pre-emptively pardoning any moral objections. It’s a sad reflection of their fear—if they truly believed their policies were just, they wouldn’t need religious cover.
Let’s be clear: Trump’s words and actions reveal an administration deeply committed to racial hierarchy and exclusion. They perpetuate a cycle where immigrant workers, many of whom have paid taxes and contributed to this country for decades, are deemed ‘less than,’ valued only for their supposed biological traits or the color of their skin.
As progressive advocates, our mission is to defend human rights and challenge unjust policies—yet the Trump administration, with Homeland Security…
![Fake Piety: How Kristi Noem and DHS use Religion to Justify Immigrant Cruelty [Video]](https://theprogressivelens.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-29-at-8.14.59-AM-e1754921362964.webp)
