I was struck by a recent article in Christianity Today, The Trump-Era Laughter at Immigrant Suffering Is Deforming Our Souls, by Russell Moore. The article discusses the “funny” memes, songs, and jokes posted by the White House and DHS, mocking Haitians, Venezuelans, and others as they are detained and deported from our country. Mr. Moore’s main thesis is that whether you support or oppose our government’s immigration policies, laughing at the suffering of non-citizens is corrosive to the individual doing the laughing and to American society writ large. “What we learn to laugh at,” Mr. Moore writes, “trains our consciences to enjoy and not to recoil from what once would have shocked us.”
Of course, I agree with Mr. Moore, and for me, the article raises some questions: What is the purpose of mocking immigrants? Who are these jokes meant for? Do they serve their intended purpose? And probably most important, how can we move beyond this cruel moment?
As Mr. Moore notes, laughter can have diametrically opposing meanings:
Laughter can be joyous and life-giving. But as with most beautiful things, when twisted, laughter can be the ugliest thing in the world. Jesus was hailed by crowds amid great laughter, yes, but he was crucified to the sound of laughter too. The soldiers dressed Jesus up in mock kingly costumery—and made fun of him, enjoying his degradation.
In Mr. Moore’s example, the soldiers mocked Jesus during his most desperate moment. Why? Perhaps it was a way to distinguish the “in” group from the “out” group, those with power from those without power. But I suspect it was something more fundamental. By ridiculing his suffering, the soldiers sought to deny the truth that Jesus represented. It was a way to reject who Jesus was and what he stood for. As that old wag Dan Aykroyd mused, “We mock what we don’t understand.” Here, the soldiers’ laughter allowed them to avoid engaging with the substance of Jesus’s message.
What, then, is the intention of the White House and DHS in mocking immigrants? For one, it offers a raison d’être for ICE agents, USCIS officers, Immigration Judges, and others working in immigration enforcement. If we convince ourselves that non-citizens are bad people, it is easier to treat them poorly. Also, it is a way to separate “us” from “them,” the good from the bad, and in many cases, the white from the non-white. It invites “us” to join in the fun, and by participating (actively or passively), we signal that we’re members of the club. Most insidiously, by degrading non-citizens and encouraging all of us to pile on, the memes and jokes are meant to dehumanize the targeted populations.
This same tactic was used by the Nazis against Jews and by Hutu militias against Tutsis, among many others. And while I don’t think we’re on the precipice of genocide, we’ve certainly become inured to non-citizens dying in ICE custody. According to its own data, 35 people died in ICE detention in FY 2026 (so far), compared with 12 in FY 2024 and four in FY 2023. On top of that, thousands of families have been torn apart and millions of non-citizens and their loved ones are living in fear. Dehumanizing people allows us to laugh at their pain, and serves as a gateway to much worse.
Are the Administration’s little jokes working? The available data suggests that they are not. Gallup polling from June 2026 finds that 39% of Americans favor or strongly favor deporting all illegal immigrants, while 58% oppose or strongly oppose that proposition. In June 2024, 47% favored or strongly favored deporting all illegal immigrants and 51% opposed or strongly opposed the idea. In other words, Americans’ attitudes toward deporting unlawful immigrants has shifted away from the Trump Administration’s position. While this is a positive development, I imagine it is cold comfort to the people who are daily harmed by our government’s assault on immigrants.
So it seems that the images of ICE agents harming people and tearing families apart has marginally shifted public opinion in favor of non-citizens. What more can we advocates do to counter our government’s efforts to dehumanize immigrants (and others)? There is obviously no magic solution, especially in this age of disinformation, but we are not powerless either. First, we should continue doing what is working–shining a light on the Administration’s cruelty, the harm it is causing non-citizens and their families, and the harm it is causing to our country. Second, we need to keep challenging the Administration’s lies. Telling these lies is intellectual dishonesty; choosing to believe them is intellectual cowardice. We can’t force people to believe as we do, but we can help give them tools to understand when they are being lied to, and to be intellectually courageous enough to question the government’s propaganda. Third, as Mr. Moore does, we need to make the moral case for treating people humanely. Whether that morality is based on religious tenets or secular values, it’s pretty basic that each of us–and especially our powerful government–should do unto others as we would have done to us. Finally, I think we need to reflect on who we want to be, and remember that how we behave towards others largely defines who we are.
All this takes courage. The intellectual courage to seek out the truth in the face of the Administration’s lies, and the moral courage to stand up to our government’s demeaning “humor.” Such courage is more necessary now than ever, for the sake of our non-citizen neighbors and for us all.
The post The Courage to Save Our Souls appeared first on The Asylumist.