TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Azya Thornton on Apr 10, 2026

A federal judge has denied a request by Lutheran churches seeking to temporarily block a Tennessee law that makes it a crime to harbor immigrants without legal status, according to the Tennessee Lookout. The 2025 Human Smuggling Act created a felony offense for knowingly transporting or harboring individuals without legal status and a misdemeanor offense for those who “harbor or hide” people in the country illegally. The Southeastern Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church filed a lawsuit arguing the law forces churches to choose between religious values and the risk of criminal prosecution. U.S. District Judge William Campbell wrote that the law’s text is “plagued by undefined terms, quixotic comma splices and redundancies that render the precise scope of the prohibited conduct less than clear.” But, he concluded there was “no evidence” the law was intended to apply to charitable services cited in the suit. State attorneys have said church leaders and staff would not be prosecuted for providing such services.