Overview
- A unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit on Tuesday kept in place a Maryland district court’s preliminary injunction that bars the Department of Homeland Security from applying its 2025 enforcement guidance to the named Quaker, Sikh and Cooperative Baptist sites.
- The court found the 2025 DHS policy likely imposes a substantial burden on religious exercise under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act because plaintiffs showed the guidance chilled attendance and disrupted ministry at their congregations.
- Judges stressed the injunction is narrow and limited to the plaintiffs’ identified houses of worship and it does not prevent arrests supported by administrative or judicial warrants or emergency actions.
- Plaintiffs offered concrete evidence of harm, including steep drops in attendance at worship and immigrant-focused programs, and said the policy’s explicit statements about targeting protected locations made the threat real for their communities.
- The decision leaves the broader legal landscape unsettled because other courts have reached different procedural outcomes and the underlying litigation over RFRA and First Amendment claims will continue.