Talarico’s Own Church Sheltered a Woman From Deportation for Seven Years. On Tape, He Laughed About It.
- $303,620 civil fine ICE issued Hilda Ramirez in 2019 for failing to depart after her asylum claim was denied — assessed against Ramirez personally, not Talarico or the church — NPR, June 21, 2023
- 7 years Ramirez and her son Ivan lived in sanctuary inside Talarico's home congregation, St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church in Austin, before receiving deferred-action protection — Texas Observer
- 2016 the year an immigration judge denied Ramirez's asylum claim and ordered her deported, prompting her to take sanctuary at St. Andrew's — Texas Observer
- 3 years of deferred-action protection the Biden administration granted Ramirez in a June 2023 settlement of her retaliation lawsuit against ICE — NPR, June 21, 2023
- 0 criminal charges, indictments, or federal investigations opened against Talarico, St. Andrew's, or Ramirez over the sheltering — Fox News, Aug. 9, 2026
James Talarico (D-TX)’s home church sheltered an undocumented mother and her son from a federal deportation order for seven years. Talarico himself described that history — laughing as he did it — in a 2023 podcast appearance that Fox News resurfaced on August 9, 2026, three hours after his U.S. Senate campaign woke up to it splashed across the network’s politics page.
“Christianity is just another word for causing trouble,” Talarico said of his congregation’s sanctuary practice on Texas Impact’s Weekly Witness podcast in June 2023. “Justice is just love out in public.” He was talking about St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin, where he has attended since childhood and which sheltered Hilda Ramirez and her son Ivan on its property for seven years after an immigration judge ordered Ramirez deported.
There is no allegation that Talarico personally broke any law, and no indication any court, prosecutor, or federal agency has opened an investigation into him, St. Andrew’s, or Ramirez over the sheltering. This is a campaign-trail story about a candidate’s own words and his church’s history — not a criminal case.
Watch: James Talarico says his church housed illegal immigrants set to be deported by ICE (Fox News)
Fox News reporter Peter Pinedo published the exclusive at 6:00 a.m. Eastern on August 9, 2026: video of Talarico — now the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Texas — laughing as he recounted his home congregation’s history of sheltering people facing deportation. The clip is not new footage. It is a resurfaced excerpt of Talarico’s June 2023 appearance on Texas Impact’s Weekly Witness podcast, where he spoke at length about St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church and its decades of sheltering people the government wanted removed.
“Christianity is just another word for causing trouble.”
James Talarico (D-TX), Texas Impact's Weekly Witness podcast, June 2023
He returned to the theme moments later, again laughing, according to Fox’s report: “Justice is just love out in public.” St. Andrew’s is not a passing reference for Talarico. He has attended the Austin church since childhood, and the congregation’s sanctuary practice predates his time in the Texas Legislature by years.
The woman at the center of the story is Hilda Ramirez, who fled Guatemala with her son Ivan and sought asylum in the United States. In February 2016, an immigration judge denied her asylum claim and ordered her deported. Rather than comply, Ramirez and Ivan moved onto the grounds of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, invoking a decades-old practice under which federal immigration agents have generally avoided enforcement actions inside churches, schools, and hospitals.
Ramirez did not leave quietly. In 2018, according to the Texas Observer, she and her family took sanctuary again at the church after a separate enforcement scare. In 2019, ICE issued her a civil fine of $303,620 for failing to comply with her deportation order — a penalty assessed against Ramirez personally, not against Talarico or the church. Ramirez sued, arguing the fine amounted to retaliation for her public sanctuary case.
In June 2023, the Biden administration settled that lawsuit and granted Ramirez three years of deferred-action protection, according to NPR — clearing the immediate threat of removal without resolving her underlying immigration status. It was in that same month, on the Weekly Witness podcast, that Talarico described his church’s role in Ramirez’s seven-year sanctuary as a matter of “justice.”
The resurfaced clip landed squarely inside a general-election Senate race. Talarico, a Texas House District 50 state representative, is the 2026 Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, running against Ken Paxton (R-TX), the sitting Texas Attorney General and the Republican nominee. Paxton’s campaign moved fast on the story, casting Talarico’s faith itself as politically selective.
“In Talarico's form of Christianity, you must be trans, you can't support the oil and gas industry, you must support late-term abortions, and you have to let in every criminal illegal immigrant seeking asylum. James Talarico hates Christianity, and he's said it.”
Madison Cercy, Paxton campaign spokeswoman
Talarico’s campaign pushed back through spokesperson JT Ennis, framing the church history as consistent with a border-security record the campaign says the attack line ignores: “James is a Christian seminarian who’s dedicated his life to the teachings of Jesus Christ,” Ennis said. “James opposes defunding the police and supports stronger border security and immigration enforcement… has said we should be arresting and deporting violent criminals and human traffickers — not moms and babies.”
The church story is not the only immigration-adjacent flashback Fox has resurfaced from Talarico’s record. In 2019, he shared a graphic from the advocacy group United We Dream advising undocumented immigrants not to open their doors to ICE agents or sign documents without a lawyer present, and in a separate 2019 post referred to undocumented immigrants in his district as his “constituents.”
His legislative record shows a consistent pattern on the issue. Talarico voted no on Texas House Bill 7, which created the Texas Border Protection Unit, and voted against Senate Bill 602 and Senate Bill 1403 during the 88th Legislative Session, according to the Daily Signal’s review of his voting history. His Senate campaign now frames that record around a distinction between violent and nonviolent offenders: ICE, his campaign site says, should be “cracking down on the cartels, not on our communities… deporting gang members, not small business owners.”
No court, prosecutor, or federal agency has opened any known proceeding against Talarico, St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, or Ramirez over the sheltering — this remains a campaign-trail story about a candidate’s own recorded words, not a criminal matter, and nothing here should be read to suggest otherwise. Ramirez’s deferred-action protection was granted for three years starting in June 2023; whether it has since been renewed is not publicly reported.
What is clear is the timing. Fox resurfaced a three-year-old podcast clip the same week Talarico’s general-election race against Paxton is drawing national attention, turning a decade-old church sanctuary story into a test of how Talarico explains his own record on immigration enforcement to Texas voters between now and November.
James Talarico’s home congregation, St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin, sheltered Hilda Ramirez and her son on its grounds for seven years after a 2016 deportation order, and Talarico described that history — laughing — on a June 2023 podcast Fox News resurfaced on August 9, 2026. ICE fined Ramirez $303,620 in 2019; the Biden administration settled her retaliation lawsuit in June 2023 with three years of deferred-action protection. Paxton’s campaign calls it proof Talarico “hates Christianity”; Talarico’s campaign points to a voting record it says favors enforcement against cartels and violent criminals over families. No charge, indictment, or investigation has been filed against Talarico, the church, or Ramirez — this is a campaign dispute over a candidate’s own words, not a legal proceeding.
